The 2005 federal budget shows that federal program spending will likely increase some $17 billion in the current fiscal year, about $12.5 billion more than projected this time last year. That is the most significant and alarming information in the entire document, according to a brief from the C.D. Howe Institute, released today.

The 8.7% overshoot is larger than any in the past 25 years and it clearly demonstrates to Canadians that Parliament is losing control of public finances, says the e-brief, written by William Robson, Institute senior vp and director of research.

“Even Canadians who do not see lower debt and tax relief as top federal priorities should view with concern this widening chasm between what the government says it will do at budget time and what it actually does,” the brief says.

The brief says that “Parliament has the power to hold the government to account, to insist that it present budgets using the same accounting practices that it will use in reporting its results at the end of the year, and to spend in the amounts and on the things that it says it will.”

The brief calls on MPs to their jobs by “focusing spending wisely, keeping the tax burden reasonable and keeping federal debt on a downward path.”

C.D. Howe ebrief http://www.cdhowe.org/pdf/ebrief_12.pdf