The Liberal government ran a whopping $11.8 billion deficit over a period of seven months last year towering over a $2.1 billion deficit during the same period in 2018.
The total annual deficit for the 2019-2020 fiscal year has so far exceeded prior predictions by several billion.
Finance Minister Bill Morneau announced the federal government’s dismal financial situation during a fiscal update at the tail end of 2019.
As part of the announcement, the Liberals revealed that the government expected to run a deficit of $26.6 billion for that year and also projected that in 2020 they would run an even higher $28.1 billion deficit.
The year’s deficit was much higher than the expected $19.8 billion the Liberals earlier predicted.
Conservative opposition finance critic Pierre Poilievre warned Canadians that the Liberals were setting the country up for failure.
“Justin Trudeau is setting the stage for a made-in-Canada recession,” wrote Poilievre in a statement.
“The debt-to-GDP ratio is rising, the deficit is $7 billion higher than Liberals promised only months ago and there is no date for a balanced budget.”
Prior to being first elected in 2015, Justin Trudeau promised Canadians that he would balance the budget by 2019 if he were elected as prime minister.
“I am looking straight at Canadians and being honest,” said Trudeau during a debate.
“We said we are committed to balanced budgets. And we are. We will balance that budget in 2019.”
According to the Fraser Institute, Trudeau has hit a record in per-person spending among all of Canada’s prime ministers even exceeding those who had to face war or recession.
The report found that Trudeau’s spending was $9,066 per Canadian which outdid Harper’s prior record in 2009 of $8,811 shortly after the 2008 financial crisis.
