The Government of Ontario just released its 2024 Budget, outlining how it will spend a whopping $214.5 billion — the priciest budget the province has ever seen, which includes a hefty $9.8-billion projected deficit.

Titled Building a Better Ontario, the budget was released on Tuesday afternoon by Minister of Finance Peter Bethlenfalvy, who noted the present "global economic uncertainty and high interest rates" that have wreaked havoc on the wallets and morale of residents provincewide.

While opposition leaders have called the update a bit of a dud when it comes to real change for the average person, here is what Doug Ford and his team are promising, in their own words:

At 4 PM today, I will be delivering Ontario’s 2024 Budget, our latest plan to continue investing in building homes, highways, transit, and healthcare, without raising costs on families, businesses or municipalities.

Watch live here: https://t.co/EMa1WWrua6#ONBudget2024 #ONpoli pic.twitter.com/lt2xS9XLCN

— Peter Bethlenfalvy (@PBethlenfalvy) March 26, 2024

Building Ontario

• Accelerating Ontario's Plan to Build, the most ambitious capital plan in the province's history, by investing more than $190 billion over the next 10 years to build and expand highways, transit, homes, high-speed internet and other critical infrastructure that will support economic growth.
   
• Increasing funding for housing-enabling municipal infrastructure projects by investing $1 billion in the new Municipal Housing Infrastructure Program, dedicated to core infrastructure projects, and quadrupling the Housing-Enabling Water Systems Fund to $825 million for municipal water infrastructure projects that would enable new housing.
   
• Addressing Ontario's housing supply crisis by rewarding municipalities that achieve their housing targets with funding from the three-year, $1.2 billion Building Faster Fund.
   
• Tackling gridlock and saving commuters time by advancing critical highway projects like the new Highway 413 and Bradford Bypass; expanding existing in-demand highways, like Highway 401 and Highway 7; supporting construction of new interchanges, including at Banwell Road and E.C. Row Expressway in Windsor, and Highway 416 and Barnsdale Road in Ottawa; and improving roads, highways and bridges in communities across Ontario.
   
• Supporting the largest transit expansion in North America, including improving GO train and GO bus services, connecting light rail transit, advancing four priority subway projects, including the Ontario Line, and bringing back the Northlander, restoring passenger rail service to Northern Ontario.
   
• Launching a new $200 million Community Sport and Recreation Infrastructure Fund to strengthen communities across Ontario by investing in new and upgraded sport, recreation and community facilities.
   
• Helping to build Ontario's end-to-end electric vehicle (EV) and battery supply chain. Over the last three years, Ontario has attracted more than $28 billion in automotive and EV battery‐related investments from global automakers, parts suppliers, and EV battery and materials manufacturers, which are expected to create more than 12,000 new permanent jobs.
   
• Enabling an estimated $8 billion in cost savings and support for businesses in 2024, including $3.7 billion for small businesses.
   
• Delivering on the most ambitious plan for hospital expansion in the province’s history, with investments of nearly $50 billion over the next 10 years in health infrastructure, including close to $36 billion in capital grants. In addition, the government is committing $620 million over 10 years to allow health care system partners to address urgent infrastructure renewal needs to extend the life of hospital and community infrastructure.
   
• Investing $6.4 billion since 2019 to build 58,000 new or upgraded long-term care beds across the province by 2028. In addition, the government is investing $155 million in 2024–25 to increase funding to fast-track construction of the next tranche of long-term care homes by November 30, 2024.
   
• Building, expanding and renewing schools and child care spaces by investing $23 billion over 10 years, including about $16 billion in capital grants. This includes $1.4 billion for the current school year to support the repair and renewal needs of schools.
   
• Allocating an additional $100 million to the Invest Ontario Fund, for a total of $600 million to help Invest Ontario attract investments and new jobs in key sectors, including advanced manufacturing, life sciences and technology.
   
• Supporting Ontario's mining sector by investing an additional $15 million over three years in the Critical Minerals Innovation Fund to enhance research and development.
   
• Increasing the Northern Energy Advantage Program (NEAP) to a total of $167 million in 2024–25, and $206 million annually in 2025–26 and 2026–27, to help eligible large industrial operators manage electricity costs and create good jobs in Northern Ontario.

Our government has released the 2024 Ontario Budget: Building a Better Ontario, a plan to rebuild Ontario’s economy and keep costs down while taking a responsible approach to the province’s finances.

Learn more about what’s in #ONBudget2024: https://t.co/lm6u8eKWki pic.twitter.com/v6TMiUZatr

— Peter Bethlenfalvy (@PBethlenfalvy) March 26, 2024

Working for You

• Investing an additional $100 million in 2024–25 in the Skills Development Fund Training Stream and continuing to implement the $224 million Skills Development Fund Capital Stream to support workers and continue developing Ontario's world-class workforce.
   
• Building Ontario's skilled trades pipeline by investing an additional $16.5 million annually over the next three years through the Skilled Trades Strategy to support a variety of programs that attract more young people into the skilled trades, simplifying the system and encouraging employer participation in apprenticeships.
   
• Keeping costs down for people and businesses by proposing to extend the temporary cuts to the gasoline tax rate by 5.7 cents per litre and the fuel (diesel) tax rate by 5.3 cents per litre until December 31, 2024. This would save Ontario households $320 on average over the two-and-a-half years since the cuts were introduced in July 2022. This relief is especially important as the federal carbon tax is set to increase on April 1, 2024.
   
• Establishing the first medical school in Canada that is primarily focused on training family doctors at York University.
   
• Helping more people access convenient health care by investing an additional $965 million in operating funding in 2024–25, including through a four per cent increase in total base hospital operations for an unprecedented second year in a row.
   
• Connecting approximately 600,000 more people to primary health care through new and expanded interprofessional primary care teams with a total additional investment of $546 million over three years, starting in 2024–25.
   
• Investing an additional $2 billion in the home and community care sector to support expansion and increase compensation for frontline workers.
   
• Strengthening and growing the health care workforce by investing $743 million over three years to help address immediate health care staffing needs and prepare for the future.
   
• Adding more health care workers in underserved communities with more than $30 million in funding to date through the expanded Ontario Learn and Stay Grant, and investing $50 million over three years to recruit and retain health care workers in Northern communities.
   
• Enhancing the health and well-being of Indigenous and Northern communities with $94 million over three years for programs that provide culturally responsive care tailored to the needs of these communities.
   
• Improving mental health and addictions services through an additional investment of $396 million over three years, building on the existing historic investment of $3.8 billion over 10 years.
   
• Providing financial support to about 100,000 additional low-income seniors by expanding the Ontario Guaranteed Annual Income System (GAINS) program and, for the first time in the province's history, indexing the GAINS benefit to inflation.
   
• Making electricity more affordable for thousands of additional low-income families by increasing income eligibility thresholds for the Ontario Electricity Support Program (OESP) up to 35 per cent as of March 1, 2024.
   
• Saving daily public transit riders on participating systems an average of $1,600 each year through One Fare. Transit riders will only pay once to transfer between GO Transit, the TTC and other participating transit systems in the Greater Toronto Area.
   
• Keeping costs down for drivers by proposing to ban any new tolls on new and existing provincial highways and freezing fees on driver's licences and Ontario Photo Cards, saving drivers an estimated $66 million over the next five years.
   
• Modernizing auto insurance to provide Ontario drivers with more affordable options, improved access to benefits and a more modern system.
   
• Increasing housing supply and addressing housing affordability by extending authority to all single- and upper-tier municipalities to impose a municipal tax on vacant homes. A new policy framework will also set out best practices for implementing a Vacant Home Tax and encourage municipalities to set a higher Vacant Home Tax rate for foreign-owned vacant homes.
   
• Deterring foreign investors from speculating on the province's housing market by strengthening Ontario's Non-Resident Speculation Tax — the most comprehensive tax of its kind in Canada — with amendments to support compliance and improve fairness.
   
• Supporting individuals facing unstable housing conditions and dealing with mental health and addictions challenges by investing an additional $152 million over the next three years towards various supportive housing initiatives designed to support vulnerable people.
   
• Protecting people and businesses by introducing legislation that would require the provincial government to first ask Ontario voters, via a referendum, before implementing any new provincial carbon pricing program.
   
• Getting students back to basics with close to $172 million for the 2024–25 school year for targeted math and reading supports and an updated kindergarten curriculum starting in September 2025.
   
• Increasing the government's investment in the Ontario Autism Program by $120 million in 2024–25, which will double the increase provided in 2023–24.
   
• Investing $46 million over three years, including for the purchase of four police helicopters, to improve community safety in the Greater Toronto Area by supporting increased patrols and faster response times to major incidents and serious crimes.
   
• Fighting auto theft with a plan that includes $49 million over three years to help police put auto thieves behind bars.
   
• Providing an additional $13.5 million over three years, on top of existing investments of $1.4 billion over four years, to enhance initiatives that support women, children, youth and others who are at increased risk of violence or exploitation.

The Minister says the Ford Conservatives are “getting it done” with this budget, but this budget proves that they’re out of touch and out of ideas.

This budget is filled with reannouncements from previous years and previous budgets – staying the course will not help.

— Marit Stiles (@MaritStiles) March 26, 2024

The Province also noted that it anticipates "slower" economic growth in various sectors this year thanks to things like inflation and Canada's record immigration numbers and population growth, which many are warning has put the nation in a "population trap" and has created "textbook demand shock" for everything from housing to medical care.