This is a big week on the financial front – not only in Newfoundland and Labrador, but for the entire country.
Prime Minister Mark Carney will deliver a spring economic statement tomorrow during a time of rising costs for just about everything but particularly gas, heating oil, and food.
Ottawa has paused the federal excise tax on gas and diesel, and boosted the GST benefit to help Canadians who are feeling the pinch but many are wondering if there will be additional measures in the fiscal update.
Premier Tony Wakeham will follow suit on Wednesday with his first budget after making a lot of expensive election promises on new spending and affordability. One of those measures last week was to soften the blow from what would have been a 7 per cent increase in electricity rates come July 1st.
He says the $45-million in an NL Hydro account will keep the increase to 2.25 per cent.
He also takes over at a time when the current account deficit is about a billion dollars, and the debt is over $20-billion – excluding Muskrat Falls.
Wakeham has said that he has no intentions of balancing the books either this year or next.
VOCM News will have live coverage of the budget starting at 2:00.
