Liberals promise $130B in new spending and no timeline to balance the budget

OTTAWA — A Mark Carney-led government will spend $130 billion on new measures over the next four years, with no timeline to balance the federal budget, according to the costed Liberal platform released on Saturday.

Carney said at a Saturday morning announcement in Whitby, Ont., that keeping the spending taps open was part of standing up to U.S. President Donald Trump.

“It’s said that there are no atheists in foxholes, there should be no libertarians in a crisis,” said Carney.

“In a crisis… the private sector retreats and government needs to step up.”

Big-ticket items include $18 billion in new defence spending, including $850 million in accrued capital investment toward new hardware like icebreakers, a $6.8 billion nation-building fund and $5 billion for internal trade corridors.

Liberals claim that the upfront spending on economic integration will grow the national economy by up to $200 billion.

“To unite this country (we) will build one economy where Canadians can work wherever they want (and) (w)here goods can move freely from coast to coast to coast,” reads the platform.

Carney has also said he’ll bring up defence spending to the NATO target of 2 per cent of GDP by 2030 at the latest.

The four-year plan also includes billions in gender and equity-related spending, including $160 million to make the Trudeau-era Black Entrepreneurship Program permanent, $400 million for a new IVF program and $2.5 billion for new infrastructure in Indigenous communities.

The platform maintains previously announced funding for Trudeau-era child, dental and pharmacare programs, as well as the school lunch program announced in last year’s budget.

New and existing measures will blow a $1.4-trillion hole in the federal budget, with some of this blow being offset by increasing federal penalties and fines for transgressions like money laundering.

The platform also prices in a one-time infusion of $20 billion in revenue from retaliatory tariffs on the U.S., during the 2025-26 fiscal year.

Carney has said that this revenue will go directly to workers and businesses affected by the tariffs.

The Liberal platform gives no timeline for a return to balance but says that the operating budget, which accounts for more than 95 per cent of federal spending, will see a modest surplus of $220 million by the 2028-9 fiscal year.

Carney said on Saturday that he would limit growth in operating expenses to two per cent per year, without cutting federal transfers to provinces, territories and individuals.

Carney has said he’ll bring in a new system of budgeting that separates spending on government programs from investments in capital like roads, bridges and military equipment, but hasn’t given specifics on how this will work.