Interim Budget Officer Steps Down as Ottawa Searches for Replacement

Interim Parliamentary Budget Officer Jason Jacques prepares to appear before the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Feb. 26, 2026. The Canadian Press/Justin Tang

Canada’s interim parliamentary budget officer (PBO) Jason Jacques has stepped down after a six-month tenure, and the Liberal government is searching for a replacement.

Prime Minister Mark Carney appointed Jacques to the interim position last September until a permanent PBO could be appointed. The seven-year term of the former PBO, Yves Giroux, ended on Sept. 2 last year.

Permanent PBOs are appointed for a seven-year term that can be renewed for a maximum of 14 years in office. However, no permanent PBO has served more than a single term.

The Canadian government officially started the hiring process for a new PBO in November. According to the job description posted online, the government is seeking a candidate to provide “non-partisan, authoritative analysis” on the state of the nation’s finances, the government’s budget and estimates, and economic trends.

The ad, which is no longer on the government of Canada’s website, said “preference may be given” to applicants who are female, indigenous, disabled, or “members of a visible minority group.” The government also said it would consider “bilingual proficiency and diversity” when assessing the applicants.

Jacques had told CTV News in November 2025 that he would apply for the permanent PBO position. He said the government had “seen what I plan on doing” and would have a “choice for this approach, the current approach, or they have a choice for a new approach.”

As PBO, he criticized the Liberal government’s deficit and fiscal guardrails. In September last year, he told the government operations committee that Canada had a “really serious” and “stupefying” fiscal outlook and that “everybody should be concerned.”

In a year-end interview with The Canadian Press, Jacques said he should not have used those words and that “people make mistakes.”

In November, Jacques said the Liberal government was unlikely to achieve the two fiscal anchors outlined in its latest budget, which included balancing operating spending with revenues by 2028–29 and maintaining a declining deficit-to-GDP ratio.

A PBO budget analysis report released on Nov. 14 found, after “stress testing,” that there was only a 7.5 percent chance the deficit-to-GDP ratio would continue declining every year from 2027 to 2030.

Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne has defended his government’s budget, with his office saying the PBO has taken a “narrow outlook of Canada’s fiscal and economic policy trajectory, looking at Canada’s budget in isolation – absent longer-term considerations and knock-on-effects.”

The Conservative Party had called for the Liberal government to appoint Jacques to a full seven-year term as PBO, arguing that his six-month term was a “short leash” that could allow the government to “fire him for telling the truth.”

“He brought unprecedented accountability. Now he’s out of a job. Who loses? The taxpayers of Canada,” Conservative MP Frank Caputo said on March 2.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recently said in a report that Canada’s “persistent delays” in appointing a new PBO could diminish the office’s stability and independence.

The OECD said in a Feb. 24 report reviewing the Canadian PBO that while the PBO is widely recognized as being “non-partisan, credible, and effective,” delays in leadership appointments and reliance on interim arrangements “present risks for the PBO’s independence and stability.”

The report recommended legislative amendments to ensure that appointments are made in a timely manner and that “structured interim arrangements with cross-party backing” be introduced.

Still, the report ranked Canada’s PBO first in the OECD’s Fiscal Advocacy Index out of the 35 countries evaluated.