The final provincial budget under Premier Doug Ford before the 2022 Ontario general election has been tabled. This 2022 budget is widely expected to be the foundation of the Ontario PC election platform, with an election scheduled to be called within days for a June 2, 2022 vote.
Ontario is now listing its total investment in pandemic response at $38 billion by the end of the 2022-23 fiscal year. That said, while the government is beating its spending and deficit forecasts established in the 2021 budget, overall spending and the deficit is expected to grow, making this the largest spending budget in Ontario’s history. Under the government’s faster growth projections, the budget could be balanced by 2024-25, although the projected range between faster growth and slower growth is a large range of $17 billion, so we need to be cautious about the likelihood of achieving balance in 3 fiscal years.
Earnscliffe breaks down the budget by the numbers with a look at major new initiatives and what this means for the Ontario PCs, NDP and Liberals.
