PCs invite public input ahead of Budget 2026

The Tony Wakeham government is welcoming input from residents, businesses, unions and others and ahead of the 2026 provincial budget, the Progressive Conservative Party’s first in 11 years.

On Tuesday the PCs announced a 28-day window for residents and business owners to fill out an online questionnaire on the government’s EngageNL website. Thy also said the government will hold “virtual sessions” in the coming weeks, and that residents can also make pre-budget submissions by email and snail mail.

“As we plan for Budget 2026, it will be so valuable to hear from the people of the province on what they want to see in our new government’s first budget,” Finance Minister Craig Pardy said in a news release Tuesday. “This engagement process will help outline the approach we take to restore fiscal balance while remaining true to our election commitments.”

In its fall fiscal update in mid-December the government projected a $948 million deficit, a stark increase from the $372 million forecast by Liberal Finance Minister Siobhan Coady in Budget 2025.

In their election platform the PCs promised a number of major policy initiatives with associated costs critics say were underestimated by the new government. During the fall election campaign the party vowed to: reduce the small business tax to one per cent, reduce the cost of air travel “to, from, and within Labrador,” hire and train more teachers in the province’s school system, Implement multi-year core operational funding to community groups, provide paid work terms for students “training in hard to fill areas, who complete their placement within the health, social, and education services of the provincial government,” raise the Seniors’ Benefit by 20 per cent, refund tuition fees for post-secondary students who stay and work in the province, and fully cover travel costs for patients who need essential care not available in their own region.

These are just some of the big commitments the PCs made, which opposition parties, industry players, small businesses, community groups, Indigenous governments and residents across the province will be watching closely for when the government drops its first budget.

In an email to The Independent, Department of Finance Media Relations Manager Kathryn Summers said Pardy will also “be meeting directly with key stakeholders to hear firsthand what they would like to see reflected in Budget 2026.

“This engagement builds on the feedback shared by residents during the fall election and provides expanded, flexible ways for people in all communities and regions to participate,” Summers said. “Input from this process will help shape Budget 2026 and support the government’s work to build a stronger, more resilient Newfoundland and Labrador for all of us.

Data obtained by The Independent through a 2024 access to information request revealed that the government received just 223 completed questionnaires via EngageNL in 2022 and 36 written submissions. In 2023, the Liberals received 374 completed questionnaires and 32 written submissions. And in 2024 the government received 350 completed questionnaires and 41 written submissions.

From a provincial population of more than a half million residents, the numbers don’t reflect health civic engagement in political decision-making. In 2021, then Finance Minister Siobhan Coady said the department would explore other ways to bolster public engagement in pre-budget consultations, but there’s no evidence the Liberals followed up on that commitment.

Asked if the new PC government was trying anything new to gather public input ahead of its first budget, Summers’s statement on behalf of the Department of Finance said residents “are being invited to participate through multiple engagement options, including an online questionnaire, virtual engagement sessions, and written submissions by email or mail.” In other words, there don’t appear to be any new or improved efforts to strengthen public input ahead of the budget.

Residents of the province can sign up for an account on the EngageNL website, which offers opportunities to share input ahead of provincial budgets, and also on other forthcoming policy or legislative matters.

Those interested in sending in a written submission can email it to Budget2026@gov.nl.ca or mail it to the Department of Finance: Main Floor, East Block, Confederation Building, P.O. Box 8700, St. John’s, NL, A1B 4J6.

The deadline for all pre-budget consultation submissions is Feb. 18, 2026.