It's a great concern. I alluded to it very quickly earlier.
In my mind, the federal government's projections for spending and borrowing in successive budgets and in economic or fiscal updates have not proved to be very reliable. This cycle of making announcements in between times is a problem. I would argue that, in fact, the habit of making fiscal updates, mini budgets with important tax changes and so on, is equally a problem.
In the U.K. recently, the government has been floating the idea—we'll see how well they stick to it—of ensuring that the annual budget is the budget that is the key fiscal document in which all major tax changes and program changes occur.
I think that would be a very good thing to do. It would make Parliament's oversight role easier. I think it would also insulate us from temptations to make these ad hoc announcements, which, on the whole, have tended to be unhelpful to the bottom line. It would be much better to have the whole thing wrapped up in an annual budget cycle that Parliament could consider properly and have fewer announcements of major spending programs and major tax changes that are done by announcements, press releases and so on.
