Mr. Speaker, the finance department publishes a monthly newsletter called the
Fiscal Monitor
. It is full of statistics, including updates on the deficit.
According to the January 28 edition of this newsletter the government has a public accounts surplus of $1.4 billion and a financial surplus of $11.3 billion. Yet in today's newspapers finance department spin doctors are estimating a year end deficit of $2 billion.
What is the finance minister's explanation of the disappearing surplus?