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TORONTO — Opposition Leader Tom Mulcair touted the New Democrats’ strong record in balancing budgets in a major speech Tuesday that sought to position his party as a fiscally responsible government-in-waiting.

On a day that resembled an election campaign — the main parties were all on the hustings — Mulcair took his economic vision to the Canada’s financial heartland, taking gentle jabs at his main political rivals, Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau.

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“I don’t believe budgets balance themselves, nor do I believe they become balanced just because you pass a law — zap you’re balanced,” he told the Economic Club of Canada.

“But I do believe that it is fundamentally important that the federal government live within its means.”

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Mulcair talked about NDP icons such as Tommy Douglas, Roy Romanow or Gary Doer — provincial leaders who balanced budgets — even as he took a shot at former Liberal MP Bob Rae, who racked up a massive deficit in the early 1990s as the New Democrat premier of Ontario, damaging the party’s electoral fortunes in the province for years.