OTTAWA— The Ontario government released a mid-year update on its finances and the state of the provincial economy Thursday. It’s light on new plans, but here’s what you need to know:

Lower deficits and a stronger economy: The top-line fiscal forecast has improved sharply since the last budget, with this year’s deficit anticipated to be $21.5 billion instead of $33.1 billion. That’s all due to much higher-than-expected revenue than the budget presented in March included—because spending is also somewhat higher.

Ontario’s expecting real GDP growth of 4.3 per cent this year and 4.5 per cent in 2022, before cooling to 2.6 per cent and 2.0 per cent in the years after. At the same time, despite increasing worries about stubborn inflation—including from the Ontario Tories’ federal cousins—the provincial finance ministry anticipates that inflation will settle down below an annual rate of three per cent after this year.

In all, the Progressive Conservatives expect to bring in $178 billion in revenue in the 2023–24 fiscal year, against $189.5 billion in total expenses. 

Innovation supports limited: The Progressive Conservative’s March budget pledged hundreds of millions for health-care R&D, auto manufacturing and incentives to build businesses outside the big cities. Thursday’s document is sparser. The government will split $48 million over the next two fiscal years between the Waterloo, Ont.-based Perimeter Institute, which is tied to the region’s budding quantum sector, as well as the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory Laboratory and other advanced research computing facilities. 

The province is also launching a new Small Business Digitization Action Plan, including a $10-million resource centre and $40 million for the Digital Main Street program, initially launched by the City of Toronto in May 2020. That follows a $10-million topup in the March budget. Ontario businesses can pull from a much bigger federal money pile to adopt technology. The Liberals’ April budget set aside $1.4 billion over four years for microgrants, training and work placements for young people to guide them through the process.

A new task force for housing: Despite the focus on housing affordability during the federal election campaign, the Ontario government is largely satisfied with what it’s already doing on that front, including streamlining development approvals and urging denser construction along transit lines. But it is proposing a richer tax credit for cleaning up polluted “brownfields” for development and to name a new housing task force.

No big plans on child care: The federal and Ontario governments have been talking about getting Canada’s most populous province one of the federal Liberals’ deals for $10-a-day child care. The update says it expects the federal government to “provide adequate and sustained funding to improve affordability and sufficient flexibility that recognizes the size and complexity of Ontario’s child care system,” it doesn’t set aside any more money for the province’s end of an agreement.