Federal coffers have a June surplus

The federal government said it ran a $1.7 billion surplus in June, after running deficits in April and May.

In a release issued Friday by the federal Finance Department, the government said the June surplus was down from the budgetary surplus of $2.8 billion it ran in June 2007.

For the first three months of the 2008–09 fiscal year, the federal budgetary surplus is estimated at $1.2 billion, down $4.4 billion from the $5.6-billion surplus reported in the same period of the previous year.

Over April and May, the federal government ran a deficit of about $517 million.

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said that three months of fiscal information is not sufficient to draw any conclusions about the outlook for the whole year. "The global economy is slowing and Canada is not an island," Flaherty said in a statement.

"We are feeling the impacts of global economic factors beyond the control of any one individual or government. While over the course of the year we are projecting positive economic growth, the outlook for real [gross domestic product] growth in Canada, based on private sector forecasts, has been revised down to 1.1 per cent in 2008, from 1.7 per cent in the budget projection," he said.

Flaherty said last month that the federal government may present a midyear fiscal update in October.

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