Liberals set to table 2023 budget. What will be in it?
Global News
The budget will also extend the temporary boost to the GST rebate for low-income Canadians, but will frame the payment as help with the rising cost of groceries.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland is set to table a federal budget in the House of Commons on Tuesday afternoon, which a federal source says will include plans to go after predatory lending and more details on dental care as part of a pitch to make life more affordable.
The government official, who was granted anonymity to discuss matters that will not be public until the budget is released, said the federal Liberals intend to amend the Criminal Code to lower the amount of interest legally allowed to be charged.
Predatory lending often involves short-term loans at sky-high high interest rates. Often marketed to people in financially precarious situations, they can create a cycle of debt tough to escape.
The Criminal Code currently caps the legal interest rate at 60 per cent effective annual interest, which has been the case since it was set in 1980 – a time when the key overnight rate set by the Bank of Canada was 21 per cent, compared to the 4.5 per cent it is today.
There is an exemption in most provinces for payday loans of up to $1,500 for 62 days or less, which means in some provinces the maximum annualized percentage rate is over 400 per cent.
The source said the 2023 budget will propose the criminal interest rate be lowered to 35 per cent, which is what it is in Quebec, where courts have ruled anything higher would violate provincial consumer protection legislation. As a result, payday loan options there are limited.
The move grows out of consultations announced in the 2021 budget, which did not address payday loans directly. The source said Tuesday’s budget will propose consultations on narrowing the exemptions to the criminal interest rate when it comes to payday loans.
Getting tough on predatory lending is one way the Liberals are expected to portray this budget as offering to help vulnerable Canadians struggling with the cost of living, while balancing the need – as strongly signalled by Freeland in her pre-budget speeches – to show fiscal restraint.
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