The Federal Government has summarized its own budget by subdividing the document into five themes: Job Creation, Small Business and Growth, Women and Early Learning and Childcare, Climate Action and a Green Economy and Young Canadians.
It is the first budget in over two years- and the initial fiscal document for Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.
There will be an extension of the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, the Canada Emergency Rent Subsidy and Lockdown Support until September 25th of this year while the Canada Small Business Financing program sees its funding increase to 560 million dollars.
Budget 2021 proposes to provide $470 million over three years, beginning in 2021-22, to Employment and Social Development Canada to establish a new Apprenticeship Service in construction and manufacturing industries.
To assist the growth of small business a Canada Technology Adoption Fund could potentially benefit a projected 160 thousand small and medium size enterprises adopt digital technologies through micro grants and zero-interest financing.
560 million dollars is a promised annual increase to the Canada Small Business Financing Program, and a Canada Community Revitalization Fund will inject 500 million dollars over two years for infrastructure projects through regional development agencies.
One of the showpieces of the 2021 Federal Budget discusses a Canada-wide Early Learning and Childcare system following the Quebec model with a 30 billion dollar investment aimed at achieving a 10 dollar-a-day childcare objective by 2026.
Almost 147 million over four years is committed to supporting Women entrepreneurship, and there will be initiatives on ending gender-based violence in both the context of truth and reconciliation and the wider society, as well as improving access to abortion nationwide.
Home retrofits will be covered off with 4.4 billion dollars starting in the summer of 2021 and continuing over a five-year period, with the program administered by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
There are plans to conserve 1 million more square kilometres of land and inland waterways, create more net-zero carbon jobs, bury carbon in the ground through a tax-credit initiative as advocated in Alberta and improve flood mapping to keep up with climate change.
Initiatives for Young Canadians include doubling Canada Student Grants for two more years, waiving interest on Students loans until the end of March of 2023 and eliminating the need for repayment of student loans for those making less than 40 thousand dollars a year.
There’s extra money for Indigenous post-secondary education, and work-placement programs on both an annual and summer job basis as well as expanded internship and apprenticeship programs.
Targeted mental health programs for populations disproportionately impacted by COVID 19 see a 100 million dollar expenditure spread over three years and a continuing commitment to the Kids Help Phone.
The forecast is contained in the government’s massive 739-page budget.
The federal government posted a 354-billion-dollar deficit for the pandemic year just over, and the budget projects a deficit for 2021-22 of nearly 155-billion.