Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government rolled out a new package this week that it says will make food more affordable, but the plan feels like a re-run of policies Canadians have already seen and paid for. The centrepiece is a rebranded Goods and Services Tax credit, now called the Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit, boosted by 25 per cent for five years starting in July 2026 and topped up by a one-time 50 per cent increase this year. Ottawa puts the cost of the first year alone at about C$3.1 billion, with total spending over six years estimated at roughly C$11.7 billion.

More than 12 million Canadians are expected to receive the enhanced benefit, with a family of four potentially seeing payments rise from about $1,100 to as much as $1,890 in the first year, while a single person could receive up to $950. Those numbers may sound generous, but they obscure a basic truth. This is not new money. It is taxpayer money being recycled through Ottawa, with administrative costs and political branding attached, much like the selective GST removal under Justin Trudeau in 2024.

The announcement also includes hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending across the food system. Ottawa has set aside $500 million through a Strategic Response Fund to help businesses manage supply chain disruptions without passing costs on to consumers, added $150 million to expand a food security fund for small and medium-sized firms, and directed $20 million to food banks and local food infrastructure. The suggestion that government spending can shield consumers from higher costs ignores a fundamental reality. The government does not generate money. It spends money collected from taxpayers. Every dollar handed out or funnelled into a program is a dollar Canadians first earned and surrendered.

That reality matters in a country where public sector employment now accounts for roughly 21 per cent of the population, or about 4.4 million people whose wages and pensions are funded by taxpayers. Adding more programs and more oversight does not reduce costs in the economy. It redistributes them.

Mandatory unit-price labelling is also being introduced as part of the package, framed as a response to shrinking package sizes and rising prices. Most Canadians do not need a federal directive to tell them groceries cost more and contain less. Anyone who shops already knows that. Labelling rules do nothing to address why prices are climbing in the first place.

The broader problem with this approach is what it leaves untouched. Carbon taxes on fuel and agriculture, trade barriers, regulatory costs and concentration in food retail all continue to shape grocery prices. Instead of confronting those drivers, Ottawa has chosen familiar territory, expanding benefit programs, layering new regulations and appointing itself referee of market behaviour.

The result is another multibillion-dollar package that treats symptoms while ignoring causes. A more serious strategy would redirect that C$11.7 billion, along with billions sent overseas and millions spent on international travel, into domestic infrastructure, pipelines, mines and energy projects that create jobs, strengthen supply chains and raise living standards. Canadians are better served by policies that allow them to earn and build prosperity, not depend on government cheques. History shows that redistribution without growth has a hard limit, and this government appears determined to find it.