Three themes the NWT government picked out from the federal budget

Is the new federal budget a win for the North, is there not much of substance, or is it too soon to tell?

NWT Premier RJ Simpson and finance minister Caroline Wawzonek seemed to select from all three columns as they gave their response to the budget in a Tuesday afternoon press conference.

“There’s a lot of stuff in here that is going to help us out,” Simpson told reporters. You can read some of the key lines from his reaction – and more about the budget itself – in our main report from Ottawa’s budget briefing room.

The GNWT also welcomed the federal government’s plan, contained within the budget, to carry out a major assessment of northern healthcare with a view to reforming things like medical travel.

Beyond that, what did the premier and finance minister learn from the budget?

Here are three themes they picked out during their news conference.

1. ‘Some very specific good things are included’

That’s a line from Wawzonek. In broad terms, both Simpson and Wawzonek seemed to find plenty to like in the budget.

Even when asked what was missing, Simpson took the opportunity to mostly list what was actually being offered.

“We’d love to see a line item for the Mackenzie Valley Highway in here, but the fact is there are items in here that are going to help us advance our priority areas,” he said.

He pointed to a billion-dollar Arctic infrastructure fund as an example, as well as money for new wildfire-fighting aircraft to be called upon nationwide.

“The critical minerals tax credit has been expanded to include additional critical minerals, ones we have here in the Territories, and we’ve been asking for that as well,” the premier said.

“But we don’t have our North of 60 Mineral Exploration Tax Credit that we were hoping for.

“So we didn’t get everything we wanted, obviously – and we never do – but we do see items in here that are either partial fulfillment of those requests or something different that is still going to help us out.”

2. There are some big question marks

Both Cabin Radio and the NWT government found many parts of the budget presented on Tuesday simply weren’t overly clear.

Even with the ability to call on federal Department of Finance staffers in the briefing room for clarity, we still couldn’t get much detail on initiatives like the northern healthcare review.

“We see a few items that really do highlight the territory, but … we really still need to dig into those programs to understand what they mean, because the budget is pretty light on details,” Simpson told reporters.

Let’s look at three examples.

First, immigration. Budget 2025 reduces the number of permanent residents admitted to Canada from 395,000 in 2025 to 380,000 for each of the next three years.

Temporary resident admissions – the likes of students and temporary foreign workers – would drop drastically from about 673,000 in 2025 to 385,000 in 2026 if this budget passes.

Ottawa had already started trying to reduce immigration numbers across the country, but the NWT government spent virtually all of this year fighting against a 50-percent cut to the federal cap for a key territorial immigration program. The GNWT only just won that fight, with its cap restored and staff working overtime to process applications and fill all the spaces before the year ends.

So what do the immigration numbers in the budget mean for the GNWT’s hopes of relying on significant levels of immigration to boost the territory’s population and fill jobs in the future?

“I looked at the immigration section there and I didn’t see any specifics for the territories. So that’s one of those items where we still have to get more information out of the federal government,” Simpson said.

Wawzonek said she would “remain optimistic” as some measures in the budget appeared to her to offer help for immigrants in specific situations.

The next example is Jordan’s Principle.

The future of this fund – designed to give First Nations children equitable access to programs and services – is critically important in the NWT, where many schools were relying on it to pay for positions.

Ottawa changed the rules relating to Jordan’s Principle at the start of this year, cutting off those schools from virtually all of the funding they previously received. School boards are now scrambling to come up with alternatives. The GNWT has had to invent an emergency $14-million fund to help.

While about $1 billion was earmarked for Jordan’s Principle and $122 million for the similar Inuit Child First Initiative in the budget, what those figures actually mean in practical terms was not clear.

“I’m glad it’s at least been acknowledged that some funding is going to be continuing in this regard,” said Wawzonek.

“Whether it’s an increase, what the changes are? That was certainly not in the first pass that I’ve read here, so it’s one we’re still going to have to dig into.”

The last example is housing cash.

The new federal housing agency, Build Canada Homes, sits under Housing, Infrastructure and Communities Canada. The GNWT could not tell, from Tuesday’s budget, exactly what’s likely to be coming for the North from that line item.

“We’ve been asking for some flexibility in how the money can be used to enable housing infrastructure – such as water, sewage, education, healthcare – because that helps communities grow and neighbourhoods grow,” said Wawzonek.

She noted Ottawa has suggested provinces and territories must “cost match” funding they receive through this area of the budget, but normally the NWT doesn’t have the money for a 50-50 split. It’s more common for the federal government to put up at least 75 percent of a project’s costs, with the GNWT covering a smaller share.

“It says right now ‘to be cost matched.’ I’ll be interested to see what that means for the territories – we don’t typically do a cost match – and also whether or not we’re going to be competing directly with all provinces to maybe access some of those funds,” Wawzonek said.

“I’m still hopeful that these will be good-news announcements for us, and that we’ll get to play a role in spending this money.”

3. A ‘shift’ from Ottawa

Simpson has previously talked about the Carney government representing a significant departure from Justin Trudeau’s administration in how it interacts with the North.

That’s partly also driven by circumstance. Arctic sovereignty has become a major issue, and Simpson said in September the North was receiving “unprecedented attention.”

On Tuesday, he said the budget similarly demonstrated “a shift” in federal philosophy in that the focus, to him, was less about social programs and more about other matters.

In a budget that deepens Canada’s deficit while still attempting significant public service cuts, Simpson said he felt some relief at the way those cuts are laid out.

“I did look at some of the departments that are very important to the North, departments like Cirnac, and they had actually very limited reductions – so not additional social programs or money for social programs, but very minor reductions,” he said in response to a question about the relative absence of social program funding in this budget.

“So that was comforting, I guess, if you can call it that,” said the premier, “that we didn’t see massive cuts in those areas.”