Weekly Writ 10/9: Budgets are moving to the fall, but what about elections?
Will the changing in the budgeting schedule impact the electoral calendar?
Welcome to the Weekly Writ, a round-up of the latest federal and provincial polls, election news and political history that lands in your inbox every Thursday morning.
You know my mind always goes to elections first.
That’s what happened on Monday when the Liberal government announced that, from now on, federal budgets will be presented in the fall rather than in the spring.
There are some good reasons to do this. But what will it mean for our scheduled election dates?
Moving the presentation of the budget from the spring to the fall has some benefits. It means new measures introduced in a budget will have a better chance of being implemented before the start of the new fiscal year. It should also make it easier for provincial governments to take into account federal decisions in their spring budget planning.
No longer will budgets be introduced after the main estimates or the start of the fiscal year, which was becoming increasingly common. The government argues that “organizations that rely on federal funding to deliver programs and services to Canadians will also have clarity on available funding ahead of the fiscal year and ahead of the construction season, ensuring projects can get underway without delay.”
Releasing budgets in the fall will also align ourselves with many peer countries, including the United Kingdom.
But here’s a little wrinkle: our fixed election date law.
That law stipulates that federal elections occur on the third Monday of October, four years after the last one. It means that when the House of Commons adjourns in June for the summer in an election year, it generally doesn’t come back again until after the election is over.
Once that is done, there’s usually a delay of at least two weeks until the new government is sworn in, meaning that in an election year business doesn’t start again until early-to-mid-November.
This won’t leave much time for a budget to be written and presented before the House adjourns again for the holiday break. A re-elected incumbent government might be able to pull it off, but a newly-installed government will face a time crunch and would not have had the opportunity to conduct budget consultations during the summer.
Might it mean that no federal budget could be presented the next time an election is held according to the fixed election date schedule? Assuming this Parliament lasts until 2029, would we have an exceptional spring 2029 budget, a very rushed and late fall 2029 budget, or no 2029 budget whatsoever?
An easy fix would be to move the fixed election date to the spring, but it would be useful to know if any thought has been put into what this means for the next election and the fixed election law in general. If this government does not survive through to 2029 (or if Mark Carney pulls the plug earlier than that), it might be a moot point. But sooner or later the clash between the new budgetary and the existing electoral calendars will have to be solved.
Now, to what is in this week’s instalment of the Weekly Writ:
News on the writ drop in Yukon and the results of a provincial byelection in New Brunswick. Plus, the NDP has a fourth leadership candidate, we get a glimpse of Mark Carney’s receipts from his leadership victory, there’s some change afoot in Prince Edward Island and Carla Beck is re-confirmed as Saskatchewan NDP leader.
Polls show some slippage in Liberal support and some very different seat projections depending on which poll you choose. We also have new numbers out of Quebec and British Columbia and for the municipal scenes in Montreal, Calgary and Edmonton.
#EveryElectionProject: A snap election call in 1920 that works wonders for Walter Foster’s New Brunswick Liberals.
Upcoming milestones for Danielle Smith and Paul St-Pierre Plamondon.
NEWS AND ANALYSIS
Yukon goes to the polls on November 3
The writs were dropped in Yukon on Friday, sending the territory to the polls on November 3.
Unlike Nunavut or the Northwest Territories, Yukon’s elections are partisan, party-based contests. The other two territories have a consensual form of government, where the legislature is made up of Independents who choose the premier and cabinet from among their number. Yukon, however, does it like a province — with a party system that is no different than in most of the rest of Canada.