The province’s health-care, university and college sectors will need to spend more to sustain their current service levels, according to reports from Ontario’s Financial Accountability Office (FAO).
The watchdog’s reports, released Wednesday, follow an independent review of provincial spending plans, outlined in the government’s 2026 budget.
The reviews serve as a benchmark to show whether the 2026 budget’s spending plan is likely to maintain, improve or reduce the quality and accessibility of various services, according to the FAO.
The province projected health-care spending would grow at an average annual rate of 3.2 per cent, the FAO’s review said. But the report found that health-sector spending would need to grow by an average annual rate of 4.4 per cent over the next three years to maintain current levels of service.
