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Ontario’s Finance Minister is offering some insight into what may be contained in next week’s budget.
Peter Bethlenfalvy is not tipping his hat too much about what will be in the fiscal document, but it does not appear it not will include tax hikes.
In a speech to the Empire Club of Canada in Toronto, Bethlenfalvy says now is not the time to hike taxes.
“There’s a different path to balancing the books. There’s a different path to helping people and businesses without raising taxes. It’s because we have a vision and a plan,” says Bethlenfalvy.
He notes that the province’s revenues have increased by $50 billion since the PCs took office without a tax increase.
Still, he says Ontario is facing economic challenges like the rest of the world.
“You have two choices in that environment. You can either put on the brakes or slow down, or you can keep going. I choose the latter. Ten times out of ten, we got to go through the cycles.”
“If you slow down supporting people, if you slow down building the critical infrastructure, you’re just delaying, you’re just going to have to play more catch up.”
The Ring of Fire continues to be an important part of the government’s move towards being a leader in electric vehicle technology.
He says investments need to be made to harvest its potential.
“If we want to have security supply, we got to develop that Ring of Fire. There is no question we have great partners in the First Nations, but we’ve got to build the infrastructure to do that.”
No mention was made of any further investments in next week’s budget.
