Ottawa’s ‘meh’ budget drew skepticism from public, finance department was told

OTTAWA — Vague, mediocre, “smoke and mirrors” — even “meh.”

Those are all words Canadians used to describe the Liberal government’s last budget in a series of focus groups, summarized in a report compiled for the finance department and recently made public.

The 2024 federal budget, delivered last April, was designed to shore up the Liberals’ political fortunes and cast a lifeline to younger generations struggling with the high cost of living across the country.

But the government-funded consultant’s report said the public’s response to the fiscal plan was mixed. Most Canadians who were asked “struggled to identify a central theme in the budget or who they felt it was aimed at.”

“The most common reaction was that the budget seemed scattered and unfocused with such a wide range of priorities and measures,” the report said. “Some felt it was ‘too little, too late’ and was made up of worthy ideas that were long overdue and should have been addressed years ago.”

National polling at the time showed the budget didn’t move the needle for the Liberals, who continued to trail the Conservatives by about 20 points.

Ottawa billed it as the first budget aimed squarely at Millennials and Gen Z, age cohorts that then-finance minister Chrystia Freeland mentioned several times in her budget speech to Parliament. But the research suggests young people did not believe the measures were focused directly at them, or would come soon enough to help them.

The Liberals rolled out individual budget items before budget day in a series of leaks and announcements designed to generate positive buzz in the media.

But focus group participants — the younger ones the Liberals were targeting — said they did not pick up on the budget items leaked in advance.

“Younger participants typically had very little or no spontaneous knowledge of the budget and the pre-budget announcements at all,” the report said.

Some even said they get “little news now that Canadian news stories are not carried on some social media sites.”

After the Trudeau government pressed ahead with its Online News Act, Meta responded with a blanket news ban on its popular social media platforms in Canada.

Canadians’ reactions to the budget were not entirely negative. But many of the policies drew similar skeptical reactions from people who argued they might not make a difference for many years, or matter much to their individual lives.

When the researchers asked focus groups about seven budget policies — such as new health care agreements with the provinces — the report said “most appreciated the goals implied by the measures, even if they were often quite skeptical of whether the initiatives described would lead to the desired outcomes.”

The finance department typically purchases public opinion research every year to gauge Canadians’ top concerns and how they view government spending measures. It does not have to make the reports public until many months after the fact.

This report was prepared by a third party, Environics Research, and delivered to the Liberal government in May of last year. It was published online in recent days without fanfare.

Environics held 10 online focus groups from April 16 to 22, reaching 66 Canadians over Zoom.

The contract cost $129,893 and included a previous round of pre-budget focus groups that formed part of a separate report.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 28, 2025.

Kyle Duggan, The Canadian Press