Last Friday, the prime minister fired his finance minister, Chrystia Freeland, who shocked the country by resigning from cabinet on Monday, hours before the fall economic statement (FES) was set to be tabled. Yet obvious tension between the two made the resignation less surprising, especially since the FES abandoned any lingering pretense of fiscal prudence, along with Freeland’s primary fiscal guardrail — a cap on the 2023-24 deficit at $40.1 billion.
