Appropriation Bill No. 4, 2025-26

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Bill C-23, An Act for granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the federal public administration for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2026.

We are approaching the end of this fiscal year, and, this week, we will consider two appropriation bills: one to close out the current fiscal year and one to initiate supply for the next fiscal year. In advance of each appropriation bill, the President of the Treasury Board tables an estimates document, either the Main Estimates or a supplementary estimates, setting out the spending authorities being sought and the details that support those requests.

The Main Estimates lay out the government’s expected spending needs for the coming fiscal year, while supplementary estimates outline additional requirements that were either not ready in time to be included in the Main Estimates or that have since been updated to reflect changes in the design, timing or costs of specific programs and services.

Because Supplementary Estimates (C) are the final estimates for the year, they not only give us a better sense of where the government is going to land in regard to its financial projections but also provide a window into changing priorities, delayed implementation, revised forecasts and spending that is no longer expected to occur on the original timetable.

I will not go over all the spending details; even my unlimited time might not be enough for that. However, I want to note that, when this bill passes this chamber, it will approve a total of $5.4 billion in voted spending. Including the appropriations approved for the Main Estimates and Supplementary Estimates (A) and (B), this will bring total voted spending to $248 billion for this fiscal year. When you add in statutory spending, it brings the total to $511 billion. After you add in $30.5 billion for EI benefits, $30.1 billion for the Canada Child Benefit and another $9.2 billion for tax credits and other adjustments, you end up with $585.9 billion in expenditures for this fiscal year.

If you turn to page 246 of Budget 2025, you will find that this was the exact amount of total expenses projected last fall.

However, if you find this reconciliation impressive, I would point out that these numbers do not represent the government’s actual expenditures for this fiscal year. That’s because the estimates provide us with approved expenditures, not actual expenditures. Voted appropriations, such as Supplementary Estimates (C), provide the authority for funds to be spent, but those funds must be spent before the end of the fiscal year or they lapse.

There are a few exceptions to this that require specific statutory authority to extend spending beyond the current fiscal year. These can be found in Schedule 2 of the legislation. Other than that, everything in Schedule 1, which is the lion’s share of the authorized expenditures, must be spent before March 31.

This creates the public sector phenomenon known as “March madness” — yes, it happens here, as well, not just in college basketball — when departments and agencies move quickly to commit or spend any remaining funds before March 31, because unspent appropriations can be interpreted as money that was not needed and may affect future funding decisions. There is an incentive for departments to use all available authorities before they expire.

This is not just urban legend; it is a well-documented practice. For example, in February 2018, Shared Services Canada sent an urgent order to Bell Mobility for about 31,000 smartphones, with delivery required within five weeks in order for them to arrive before the end of the fiscal year and qualify as 2017-18 expenditures.

Last year, in a response to an Order Paper question, we learned that the federal government spent $1.5 billion in a 10-day end-of-the-fiscal-year spending spree: From March 22 to March 31, 2025, federal departments recorded $382 million in spending on supplies and $1.1 billion on equipment and machinery.

This, colleagues, is beyond “March madness.”

In spite of this perverse spending incentive, some approved expenditures are still never actually spent. The money can either be left on the table, which becomes reported as “lapsed funds,” or it can be taken off the table through what are referred to as “frozen allotments.” Frozen allotments are funds that Parliament has already approved in voted authorities but that the government has subsequently decided should not be spent in the current fiscal year. In some cases, access to those authorities is restricted until a specific condition is met. In other cases, departments and agencies are directed not to use the funds at all.

It is important to note that, even though these are called “frozen” allotments, these appropriations are never “unfrozen” after the end of the fiscal year. It’s not holding on to the money and just deferring the spending to a future year; it is a top-down decision telling the department that the money is no longer available. In order for it to become available again, a new spending authority must be passed by Parliament in the form of a supply bill. For example, documentation provided with Supplementary Estimates (C) shows us that, as of February 5, 2026, a total of $7.4 billion in voted authorities have been frozen. However, as the Parliamentary Budget Officer has pointed out, the annual reporting of frozen allotments in Supplementary Estimates (C) has consistently fallen significantly short of the actual total reported later in the public accounts. Between 2017-18 and 2024-25, frozen allotments listed in Supplementary Estimates (C) have only been 24% of the total frozen allotments for a given fiscal year, on average.

This method of reporting figures poses a problem. When Parliament is called upon to approve expenditures, it should also be able to see, with reasonable clarity, what proportion of those approved expenditures will never be used.

If the frozen allotments presented in Supplementary Estimates (C) represent only a fraction of the total that appears later in the public accounts, then MPs are not getting a complete picture at the very moment they are being asked to authorize additional funds. This undermines oversight. It makes it harder to distinguish between funds that are genuinely needed, funds that have simply been carried over and funds that were approved but, in reality, were never going to be spent in the first place.

At a minimum, Parliament should be able to quickly and clearly see how much of the authorized money has already been frozen, how much will not be used and why. Without this information, it is difficult to compare forecasts with actual expenditures and hold the government to account for how public funds are — or are not — being used.

Honourable colleagues, Supplementary Estimates (C) is the final appropriation bill for this fiscal year. It brings up the question of the deficit. Budget 2025 projected a deficit of $78.3 billion for this fiscal year, but, by this stage, the more relevant question regards whether that number still looks realistic. The deficit is measured on an accrual basis, which means it does not move simply because spending is announced or authorized; it moves when expenses are actually recognized in the government’s accounts. While the Supplementary Estimates (C) do not by themselves determine the deficit, they do give us a clearer sense of where the government is going to land.

On the basis of the budget forecasts, the year-to-date fiscal results and the pressures that have continued to build over the course of the year, it would not be surprising if the final deficit were to come in above the government’s original projection of $78.3 billion — possibly as much as $82 billion or even $85 billion.

But that obviously doesn’t surprise any of us.

If this estimate is accurate, it will have a domino effect. To the extent that the government blows past its deficit projection of $78.3 billion, it will push the benchmark for its fiscal anchor higher as well, allowing it to run deeper deficits each year and still claim to be within the guardrails of their fiscal anchors. All of this overspending increases our national debt which, in turn, increases our debt-servicing costs. This eats up more of our fiscal room, making it more difficult to provide the public services that Canadians rely on, even as the population ages.

That’s why when we had the Minister of Health here, she had a hard time explaining the justification for why 6.5 million — almost 7 million — Canadians can’t find a family doctor.

Colleagues, our responsibility today is not simply to approve another line in the government’s spending ledger. It is to insist on clarity, discipline and honesty in the management of public funds.

Yesterday, the choice of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, or PBO, was something that gave me some hope. I thought she was transparent and professional, and, hopefully, she will apply herself with the degree of vigour that we expect from a PBO to ensure that transparency and accountability on behalf of this government — and all governments — continue to be a hallmark of what this Parliament is all about.

The Supplementary Estimates (C) may be procedural in form, honourable colleagues, but it raises substantive questions about spending control, fiscal transparency and the government’s shrinking room for error. If we do not take those questions seriously now, we will only face harder choices ahead.

Honourable colleagues, I reiterate that we’re not a house of confidence. We’re not here to circumvent the will of the democratic house, but we are definitely here to add to the principles of transparency, accountability and parliamentary surveillance. That is our obligation to taxpayers and to all regions of the country.

For that reason, the official opposition cannot support this particular supplementary estimates budget.

Thank you.