With election speculation swirling in Ottawa, the government confirmed Monday that the next federal budget will be tabled on Feb. 26.
It would be the minority Conservatives' third -- and possibly last -- budget that would bring down the government should the Opposition Liberals vote against it.
That means Canadians can expect an election as soon as mid-April.
It has been hinted that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty would introduce new measures to encourage research and development, boost funding for environmental projects, raise the low income tax benefit and extend tax write-offs for the manufacturing and forestry sectors.
But it's not clear whether the budget will contain any contentious measures the opposition parties can jump on to defeat the government.
Both Flaherty and Prime Minister Stephen Harper have warned Canadians not to expect any major new tax measures, saying economic slowdown would make it difficult to introduce any significant tax cuts and spending measures.
"There isn't a whole lot of money the Conservatives have to play with. There won't be a lot of goodies being showered on Canadians," said CTV parliamentary correspondent David Akin.
"I think we've seen all the big tax breaks we're going to see from this federal government, and the last one -- the Liberals did bring in $150-billion worth of income tax cuts. The Conservatives continued that trend, but that's about it, the kitty's pretty much dry as far as any tax cuts go."
But though observers say this budget would be relatively insignificant as far as budgets go, it would still be a politically-significant document because it could trigger a spring election.
It's believed Liberals would much rather go to the polls over the budget than any other issue, including the Tory crime bill and the Afghanistan mission.
There will be several days of debate after the budget is tabled and the first confidence vote on the document would take place in early March.
The prime minister has said recently he doesn't intend to bring down a deficit budget with spending measures in order to stimulate the economy.
"This is where we see some real stark contrasts between the two philosophies of the Liberals and the Conservatives," said Akin.
The Conservatives have been very keen to maximize paying down the national debt. The Liberals, on the other hand, are saying "'listen, no one in the world is saying we have a debt problem. We have the best debt-to-GDP ratio of any G-7 country.'
"In other words, the debt's not a problem. Having some debt is normal and we ought to use some money we have in surpluses, etc. to help, perhaps, laid-off workers in industry,'" said Akin.
"And that, in fact, may be what we see the election is all about, is how best to use the federal government to keep Canada's economy going."
Dion told CTV's Question Period on Sunday his party is ready to vote against the next budget if he decides it's "wrong for the country."
