Spending too little worse than spending too much, Freeland says in fall update

OTTAWA — Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s first fall mini-budget finds new funds for families and businesses and scratches a longtime provincial itch over transfer payments as she tries to find a delicate balance between pandemic anxiety and political prudence.

Freeland defends the federal government’s record deficit of more than $381 billion as affordable and necessary, arguing the government would make a bigger mistake by spending too little than by spending too much.

However Freeland responds to calls for some sense of when the federal largesse will end by promising what she calls “guardrails” to guide when federal stimulus will start to be phased out.

She is using the fall update to respond to calls from numerous political critics and interest groups with funds for parents of young children, aid for hard-hit sectors like tourism and entertainment, and another $1 billion to help provinces with the long-term care homes that have left our oldest citizens tragically vulnerable to COVID-19.

Fully aware that the Liberal government needs support from at least one other party to stay alive she handed the NDP another win by extending the federal interest holiday for student and apprentice loans through to the end of the next fiscal year.

Freeland also threw out another olive branch to provincial premiers by promising to answer their years-long call to overhaul the fiscal stabilization fund that sends federal cash to provinces facing serious drops in revenue.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 30, 2020.

Mia Rabson, The Canadian Press