Saskatchewan repeals ‘balanced budget’ law

REGINA – The Saskatchewan government is repealing its balanced budget legislation known as the Growth and Financial Security Act.

The act required the province to balance the books every year, unless there’s an extraordinary event such as a disaster, and said the government couldn’t introduce two consecutive deficit budgets.

Finance Minister Kevin Doherty says the legislation is “completely irrelevant” because Saskatchewan has changed how it presents its books.

The act applied to the general revenue fund, which was just the government’s operating expenses and revenues, he said.

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But the government now budgets on what is called a summary basis, which includes all parts of government and Crown corporations, and was recommended by the auditor.

Doherty said the goal is still to balance the budget, but says it remains to be seen whether that requirement will be in new legislation to be introduced this fall.

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“We don’t know that yet,” Doherty said Monday, after tabling legislation to repeal the old act.

“One of the things that the provincial auditor has said to us is that under summary financial statements, having balanced budget legislation in place that indicates a government must balance its budget every single year is difficult because of the variations that can occur on a daily basis.”

For example, Doherty said, if interest rates drop or go up on the day when the snapshot for the financial statement is made, it can swing a budget “by hundreds of millions of dollars” on things such as pension liabilities.

Doherty said the government wants to talk with the auditor and academics and see what other provinces are doing as it writes new legislation.

The Growth and Financial Security Act was the first piece of legislation introduced by the Saskatchewan Party after it won the 2007 provincial election.

The Opposition NDP charged in February that the Saskatchewan government was breaking its own law by running back-to-back deficits.

At a budget update in February, Doherty said the government was expecting a deficit of $427 million for the fiscal year that ended March 31, 2016. He also said the government was aiming for a deficit of $259 million for the 2016-2017 fiscal year.

However, the 2016-2017 budget tabled last week projects a $434 million deficit.

The government is facing a revenue shortfall because of a drop in oil prices and the cost of fighting forest fires last summer.

But Doherty said the government didn’t introduce a deficit budget last year. He noted that the 2015-2016 budget initially projected a surplus of $107 million “that turned into a deficit.”

“We’re splitting hairs here with respect to a document or a piece of legislation that referred specifically to the general revenue fund. We don’t operate on a general revenue fund any longer, so it’s no longer relevant to that,” he said.