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With Ontario’s 2016 budget set to land next week, all eyes are on how the province plans to balance the remaining $7.5-billion deficit by the end of next fiscal year. But a new report is offering a different narrative, looking back at how the provincial deficit ballooned to that amount in the first place and suggesting it could have a multi-billion surplus instead.

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tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Ontario could have surplus as high as $15B if spending had been restrained, Fraser Institute report says Back to video

The provincial books have been in the red since the 2008/09 recession, and many were sceptical the Liberals could balance by the long-promised 2017/18 deadline. They are expected to finally hit the black, but not before Ontario’s debt tops $298 billion sometime this year. And a new Fraser Institute report finds it didn’t need to be this way, in fact, it argues Ontario could have between a $10 and $15 billion surplus.

How?

If it had held spending growing to inflationary pressures over the past decade.

Prevailing logic has held that decreased revenues during the recession, cuts in federal transfers and investments intended to boost the economy increased the deficit, but Fraser Institute says spending decisions by the Liberal government was the biggest contributor.