OTTAWA - The Canadian government does not have much fiscal room for maneuver for the next two years because of commitments to transfer funds to the provinces, Finance Minister Ralph Goodale said on Friday.
"I believe that we've got an overall robust fiscal situation but we do have an anomaly in the flow of the fiscal profile," Goodale told reporters, days ahead of presenting the government's 2005-06 budget on Feb. 23.
"We have a particularly good year in '04-05, the current year that's about to end (on March 31), because of the sale of Petro-Canada and because of a number of other factors that raised the surplus this year," he said.
Canada has rung up a surplus of C$11 billion ($8.9 billion) for the first nine months of the fiscal year, including a C$2.6 billion gain from the share of the government's Petro-Canada stake.
"But the next two (fiscal) years when the equalization and health flows begin to go to the provinces, those two things combined constitute a big hit on the fisc, and that reduces our flexibility in the next two years," he said.
Source.
Bookmark mackaycartoons.net
