Gage Haubrich is the Prairie Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.The Saskatchewan government is betting hundreds of millions on the unpredictable political situation in the Middle East.The government just released its 2026-27 First Quarter Fiscal Update. And largely due to increasing oil prices, it’s taking in about $331 million more in revenue than it budgeted this year.So, the government is using this lucky one-time windfall to borrow less, right? Wrong.Instead, the government is spending $337 million more than it said it would on budget day. Finance Minister Jim Reiter spent every dollar as fast as it came in.The government didn’t do anything clever to earn this windfall revenue either. It simply grabbed the bucket of cash sitting by the door.This lucky windfall isn’t even analogous to a bonus at work. Bonuses are for doing a good job. This windfall revenue is more like winning the 50/50 at a WHL game. All you had to do was show up. But even if the windfall is based on luck, it’s still up to you to use it responsibly..That means paying bills or investing for the future. The last thing you should do is plan your household budget assuming you are going to win the 50/50 every weekend.But that’s exactly what the provincial government is doing. It didn’t treat this windfall like the one-time revenue boost it is. Instead, it increased spending as though the money would keep rolling in every year.And that’s the worst part. Spending this windfall doesn’t just squander a one-time opportunity. It could leave the province’s finances worse off in the long run. This windfall revenue probably won’t be around next year, and taxpayers will be stuck paying for ratcheted-up spending with tax hikes or even more reckless borrowing or both.And it’s happened before. The last big windfall for the government came in 2021. In that year, the government took in 25% higher revenue than the year before. The average revenue increase was about 1% in the five years prior.The government increased spending by 25% in the same year compared to 2020. If it had held spending at the previous year’s, an all-time high for the province, it could have paid down $2.2 billion in debt instead of increasing it by $1.4 billion.There’s a better way. The Alberta government also just released its first-quarter report. It also received a windfall due to rising oil prices. It could have spent it all, but it didn’t. Alberta’s debt was set to soar above $100 billion for the first time in its history this year. However, because of this revenue windfall and spending restraint from Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, the debt will come in $14 billion less than budgeted..That’s how you manage revenue windfalls.Taxpayers know this windfall won’t fix all of the Saskatchewan government’s fiscal problems, but the government should have at least used it to stop digging the debt hole deeper.Premier Scott Moe more than doubled the provincial debt. It’s now on track to reach $26.8 billion this year, with interest charges alone costing taxpayers more than $1 billion. Yet the government isn’t even trying to find savings to fix it. Instead, it increased spending in all but one department in its last budget. The Saskatchewan government is not even finding savings by cutting the small stuff. The government billed taxpayers more than $17,000 to charter two private planes to take politicians from Regina to Saskatoon to attend a conference last year.But debt and overspending are something that taxpayers know needs to be fixed. Insightrix polling shows that 87% of Saskatchewanians are concerned about the growth of provincial government debt.The fix is simple: Stop budgeting like the government will win the 50/50 every weekend. Cut waste and stop borrowing money.Gage Haubrich is the Prairie Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
