COLUMN: View from the Legislature – Can we handle the financial truth?

“You can’t handle the truth!” That was, for people of my generation, the iconic line spoken by actor Jack Nicholson in the movie, A Few Good Men. This came after he was challenged by Tom Cruise, who was playing an attorney and was demanding that Nicholson, who was giving testimony in a trial, tell him the truth.

When it comes to public finances these days, it seems like many political leaders are telling Canadians that they can’t handle the truth.

The first example comes from the federal Liberal government and new Prime Minister Mark Carney who, despite having an impressive financial resume, seems determined to not tell Canadians exactly what the state of the federal finances are. To be fair, Prime Minister Carney has a lot to deal with these days when it comes to trade negotiations, but there is an entire Department of Finance whose primary purpose is to produce a budget. And yet, months after his election no budget is in sight. There are certainly many warning signs that things are not in good shape. Mr. Carney has instructed his Cabinet Ministers to find significant savings in their departments and warned that there will be a reduction in federal civil servants.

What is unclear from the Carney government is how successful these cost cutting measures may be, who exactly they will impact and how deep the financial hole the federal government is trying to get out of is. That’s because they won’t produce a budget. We know that there is increased spending happening, including a promise to significantly increase military spending. And while these expenditures may be welcomed, there is still an onus on the government to tell the people who pay for these things, Canadians, how that is happening. Is it through more debt or higher taxes, or both?

Here in Manitoba, the provincial NDP government are almost as secretive about the finances. While they did produce a budget in the spring, it contained two sets of books, depending on what the impact of tariffs would be. Now several months from the budget, we still do not have any clear sense of how the NDP plan to balance the books over the next two years as they have promised to do.

We know that the economic growth projections for Manitoba have been downgraded, there have been significant forest fires, and the NDP have been overspending the budget in many areas. So, what are the new financial projections for the Manitoba government and, if they are worse than promised, which is almost a certainty, then how is that being managed? If it is through higher debt and higher taxes, that is something Manitobans should know about sooner than later.

It was late last year that the NDP told Manitobans that their deficit projections for the 2024-2025 budget were way off (by half a billion). And things seem to only have gotten worse since then. So, it is time that we find out what the real financial projections are and what the government plans to do about them.

Government finances are certainly not as entertaining as a movie, but the consequences are much more important so need to be watched closely. Having prime ministers and premiers act as though taxpayers can’t handle the truth, isn’t going to result in a Hollywood ending.