No balanced budget without free trade with U.S.: Quebec Finance Minister
Posted November 28, 2025 1:27 pm.
Last Updated November 28, 2025 1:33 pm.
The path to returning to a balanced budget is “tight,” Finance Minister Eric Girard acknowledged on Friday. If Canada and the United States fail to reach a trade agreement next year, Quebec may have to suspend its balanced budget law.
The minister said this scenario was unlikely during a speech to the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal to present the broad outlines of his budget update.
If U.S. President Donald Trump were to end free trade between the two countries, the consequences for Quebec’s economy and budgetary situation would be significant, he warned.
The government would then have no choice but to support the economy at the expense of its budgetary schedule, he said.
With the fall 2026 election campaign approaching, Girard indicated that the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) still intends to reduce the tax burden on Quebecers, but that any such move would be conditional on a return to a balanced budget.
The minister did not respond directly to questions about whether political parties would have the financial leeway to make election promises during a press scrum on the sidelines of the event.
However, he suggested that the more likely a party was to form a government, the more inclined it would be to present a realistic financial framework.
–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews
