OTTAWA—Prime Minister Stephen Harper tried Friday to alter the impression left by his finance minister that Canadians may not see tax breaks promised by the Conservatives before the next federal election.

Revising the timeline for balancing Ottawa’s books laid out in the government’s fall economic update, Harper expressed hope the Conservatives can eliminate the $26-billion budget deficit before Canadians go to the polls again, likely in 2015.

“It remains the government’s plan — intention — to balance the budget prior to the next federal election,” he said at a news conference in Quebec City.

In the 2011 election campaign, Harper pledged to bring in several popular tax savings measures for individuals, including a doubling to $10,000 a year of tax-free savings account limits, income-splitting for young families and a doubling of the children’s fitness tax credit.

But he said on the campaign trail that the tax breaks would be held off until the Conservative government could eliminate the annual federal budget deficit — something Harper said at the time could be accomplished by early 2015.

On Tuesday, however, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said in his annual fall economic report Ottawa’s books won’t be balanced until early 2017. That means Canadians might have to wait an extra two years for the promised personal tax cuts. It also means the tax breaks wouldn’t emerge until after the next federal election.

Flaherty’s deficit revelation drew national attention and prompted complaints from taxpayers’ advocates and opposition MPs.

But on Friday Harper revised the government’s budgetary timeline. “The recent economic and fiscal update by (Flaherty) indicates we are actually very close to that objective of eliminating the budget deficit,” Harper said. “We’re not quite where we want to be but we’re very close.”

Canadian Taxpayers Federation federal director Gregory Thomas said Harper probably felt it was necessary to change the impression left by Tuesday’s report. “I think he knows that he promised to balance the budget and to do so a full year ahead of schedule, so Flaherty has bumped the balancing date back two fiscal years from what was promised during the election.

“So Harper realizes it’s his credibility and his finance minister’s credibility on the line and people who voted his party into office took those commitments on tax cuts seriously,” Thomas told the Star.

“Clearly they’re making it up as they go,” NDP finance critic Peggy Nash responded. “We heard on Tuesday from the finance minister that they were not going to be able to balance the books before 2015. Now suddenly, three days later, they are. So who knows?”

Flaherty brushed aside suggestions that he and Harper were split over deficit-reduction projections.

“The prime minister and I are on the same page and we always have been on budgeting,” Flaherty said in a telephone news conference from New York, where he delivered a luncheon speech.

Asked about the discrepancy between Harper’s words Friday and the fiscal update, Flaherty said it’s wrong to hold the federal government completely accountable for its forecasts.

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“What budgets are about and what fiscal projections are about is direction and track,” Flaherty said. “If you want to rely on a specific number two or three years out, you can do that, but it’s probably not the number that will be there two or three years from now because variables change and revenues change and expenses change.”

Meanwhile, the government announced Friday that it is chopping jobs faster than expected, axing more than 10,000 federal positions in the past six months. The spring budget set a goal of cutting 19,200 jobs over three years.

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