Politicians are only ever as good as their word, which they all seem to break with depressing regularity.

It’s easy to be cynical considering Tory record, but the idea is worthy

It’s tough to be late- cycle politician, is it not? You get no respect. Consider Finance Minister Joe Oliver, whose proposal for balanced- budget legislation has met with general skepticism and scorn. How can these Conservatives, who’ve not managed to produce black ink in seven long years, suggest this with a straight face? Not to mention the record of abrogation, shilly- shallying and simple deceit that has followed such rule- making in numerous other jurisdictions.

And yet, there’s this: What if a federal law such as the one Oliver proposes could be made to stick? Wouldn’t that be good policy for Canada? History shows us rather clearly that it would.

Let’s examine what Oliver said — the intellectual and logical foundations of his proposal. In non- recessionary times, the government would be allowed to spend no more than it takes in from taxes. When the economy is receding — or in the event of a war or natural disaster that tips the scales by at least $ 3 billion — deficits would be permitted, if not encouraged. In a situation such as the great recession of 2009, when the world teetered on the brink, stimulus could flow.

Should Oliver base his new law on the 2009 case, which he likely will, there might even be a provision requiring that deficit- financed stimulus be project- oriented, rather than create new federal programs with ongoing fixed costs. Politicians who spend more than the government takes in, beyond what is allowed under terms of the new law, would push the bureaucracy into an immediate freeze in operating spending; and the offending pols would see their pay docked five per cent. A deficit budgeting finance minister would need to account for his actions before the parliamentary finance committee within 30 days, and demonstrate a path back to balance.

John Maynard Keynes, guru to every deficit spender in modern history, would approve. And so should the Opposition parties. The Liberals and New Democrats, as Oliver noted in his speech to the Economic Club of Canada, were themselves instigators of the late Jim Flaherty’s pivotal $ 56- billion deficit budget of 2009; it was their threat to bring down the Harper government, then in a minority, that prompted it. Holler though they may about the five successive deficits since — which have steadily shrunk except for an uptick in 2013 — it is impossible to imagine a Liberal or New Democrat government having returned the books to balance any more speedily.

Would a balanced- budget law be binding on future governments, including this one, if it were re- elected? The record says no. As my colleague Andrew Coyne notes, this regime has flouted its own laws whenever it deemed it expedient. And politicians are only ever as good as their word, which they all seem to break with depressing regularity. The most spectacular example is former Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty, who solemnly promised during his 2003 campaign, in writing no less, to balance the books and raise no new taxes. He promptly broke both pledges, not tentatively but with gusto, in his first budget. He was subsequently rewarded with two more majorities, sending a message to every other Canadian politician.

Even so, politics being the art of the possible and not the ideal, legislation such as Oliver proposes is worthwhile, if only because it would create a standard against which this and future governments can be measured, and blasted for hypocrisy when they fall short. They would have to explain themselves. And the Keynesian escape hatches actually make the plan more resilient and impervious to easy abrogation.

Plus, there’s this: Principled fiscal responsibility has increasingly few friends in high places. Even Alberta, which started the ball rolling in the early 1990s, has lost the thread. ( Wildrose, supposedly the country’s staunchest red- meat conservatives, are promising to balance Alberta’s budget by 2017.)

In this context, even faked federal fiscal conservatism is welcome.