Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Sunday the federal government will present its budget in the autumn, following earlier indications from the finance minister that only an economic update would be tabled later this year.
Speaking at a press conference in Rome after attending the inauguration of Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican, Carney said there was little value in rushing a full budget through in the limited time available before summer, given the recent formation of the new Liberal cabinet.
“There is not much value in trying to rush through a budget in a very narrow window — three weeks — with a new cabinet,” Carney said.
He noted that it would be premature to finalize a budget before the NATO summit in June or before deeper discussions with the United States on their bilateral economic partnership. The government is also examining cost-cutting measures and ways to improve the efficiency of the public sector.
“Defense spending, the economic outlook, including the tariff relationship with the United States, and the [government] efficiency… all of those coming together, we will have a much more comprehensive, effective, ambitious, prudent budget in the fall,” he said.
Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne had earlier suggested that the government would present an economic update later in the year, hinting that a full budget was not imminent.
In a post on social media platform X late Saturday, Champagne said 70% of tariffs imposed in retaliation to U.S. tariffs remain in place. The post appeared to be in response to criticism from Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre, who claimed Carney had “quietly dropped retaliatory tariffs to ‘nearly zero’ without telling anyone.”
Carney also met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen during his visit to the Vatican, ahead of the G7 summit to be hosted by Canada in June.
