Champagne previews the budget in Toronto: simpler taxes for small business and a $36 billion push for private investment

By The Canadian Chronicle · Tuesday, November 3, 2026

Politics · Federal · The Canadian Chronicle

Published Tuesday, November 3, 2026 · Last updated Wednesday, November 4, 2026 · 3 min read

With two days left before the federal budget, Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne used a Canadian Club Toronto breakfast on Monday to set out what Thursday's document is for. The message was domestic: build up the economy at home, and make the tax system simpler for the businesses that employ most Canadians.

The small business promise

Champagne told business leaders the budget will look to make life easier for Canada's small- and medium-sized businesses. In a fireside chat after his speech, he pointed at the tangle of boutique tax measures those firms now face.

"We had a number of boutique things and things which might be difficult if you're small and medium-sized businesses, unless you have a tax adviser to figure out what's the best way forward," Champagne said. He said owners will see "a journey to fixing a number of things, to make things more simple."

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has asked Ottawa to use the November 5 budget to lower the small business tax rate. It has also asked the government to fix gaps in the federal tariff relief regime that leave smaller firms out.

The $36 billion centrepiece

The biggest priced item already attached to the budget is the productivity mega-deduction, announced in September. It lets businesses write off eligible capital purchases immediately instead of depreciating them over years.

The measure is estimated to cost $36 billion over five years. The government presents it as the engine of a shift to private-investment-led growth, aimed at Canada's long-standing productivity problem.

Champagne would not give specific examples of the small business changes on Monday. He said the details land on Thursday, when the budget is tabled in Parliament. It is the second budget delivered under Prime Minister Mark Carney, and it carries the title "Masters of Our Destiny."

The deficit test

The spending side of Thursday's test is already on the record. The Parliamentary Budget Officer projects a deficit of $63.3 billion in 2026-27, peaking at $70.2 billion in 2027-28.

The PBO also predicts the government will not meet its own anchor of a declining deficit-to-GDP ratio. Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre made that anchor the centre of his own pre-budget letter on November 1, calling it the bare minimum.

Poilievre's letter also asked for relief at the pump: eliminate all federal taxes on diesel until Canada Day, and suspend the GST on fuel until summer. Monday's preview did not address those demands. Whether they appear in Thursday's document is one of the open questions budget day will answer.

What was not settled

Two anticipated files went unmentioned in the Toronto speech. Champagne did not confirm whether the budget will detail a proposed sovereign wealth fund, and he did not confirm a proposal to open Canadian airports to private investment.

That leaves the shape of the government's investment push only partly visible ahead of Thursday. The costed items, the tax changes, and the deficit track in the budget's own tables will settle what the preview left open.

The Record

Champagne's commitment is checkable, and the Chronicle records it here: on November 2, the finance minister said Thursday's budget will begin fixing and simplifying the tax rules for small and medium-sized businesses. The test is the budget itself, tabled November 5 — the changes either appear in it, in terms a small business can use without a tax adviser, or they do not.

Budget eve

On Tuesday, November 3, a senior government source added the frame around Monday's preview: new affordability measures and investments in infrastructure, defence and culture, organized around three pillars. The small business tax changes Champagne trailed remain undetailed until the budget is tabled on Thursday, November 5 — the test recorded in this story's Record note.