Cabinet does not have “oceans of money” to shield Canadians from the rising cost of living, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said yesterday. Freeland’s remarks to the House of Commons finance committee followed a 56% hike in the federal debt ceiling..“It’s quite different from what we needed to do when COVID hit and we had to shut down the economy,” said Freeland. Cabinet was “taking clear steps to show fiscal responsibility,” she added..“We collectively said we needed to shut down the economy and in order to ask people to do that and to prevent economic scarring it was necessary for the government to put a floor under the economy, to support businesses, to support households,” said Freeland. “The inflation and affordability challenge is quite different.”.According to Blacklock's Reporter, Parliament last year voted to raise the debt ceiling under the Borrowing Authority Act from $1.168 trillion to $1.831 trillion, a $663 billion increase. The Parliamentary Budget Office in a January 19 report said about $69.2 billion in pandemic-era spending had nothing to do with COVID. “Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic the government has spent or planned to spend $541.8 billion in new measures,” said the report..“We cannot fully compensate every single Canadian family and every single Canadian business for the higher cost of inflation,” Freeland said yesterday. “If we did that it would be this Sisyphean struggle and we would be pushing huge oceans of money into the economy and making the Bank of Canada’s job even harder.”.Sisyphus was a figure from Greek mythology doomed to perpetually push a rock up a hill. Parliament has not balanced a budget since 2007..“Since you’re so much about fiscal responsibility then Minister, maybe you could just tell us when you believe the budget will be balanced,” said Conservative MP Dan Albas (Central Okanagan-Similkameen, B.C.). “We are taking steps to show fiscal responsibility,” replied Freeland..Budget Officer Yves Giroux in testimony last Tuesday at the Senate banking committee predicted federal debt service charges will double this term. “They will probably go from $23 billion to $46 billion,” said Giroux..Debt charges are on track to eclipse the $26.5 billion national defence budget this year. Giroux said he would provide more details in the report this month. “More to come on that,” he said..“Have you looked at the impact in regard to the interest the government will have to pay on its debt?” asked Senator Pierre Ringuette (N.B.). “That is something that will have a major impact on public finances,” replied Giroux.
