A recent credit rating downgrade, and rising interest rates mean debt servicing costs could go up millions of dollars overnight.

"Government pays a bill for its interest in order to borrow money," Morden-Winkler MLA and Finance Minister Cameron Friesen explains. "That bill on our interest is going up."

The Province's monthly debt service charges, like a floating mortgage, is effected by its credit rating and interest rates.

However, S&P Global Ratings recently downgraded Manitoba's rating, citing an almost billion dollar deficit.

While encouraged by the current government's seven-year plan to return to balance, "they will not prevent the government from posting large after-capital deficits over the next two years, in our view," the report explains.

The downgrade comes after an initial rating drop last July.

"We can't continue to allow expeditures to run above revenues and think it somehow won't cost us more in the long term," Friesen says.

He says the rating underscores the importance to return to balance.

"Some people say we're going too fast, some people say we aren't proceeding quickly enough," Friesen says. "We think we're taking a balanced and moderate approach to build the Manitoba economy, invest in our frontline services, and fix the finances."

The province has implemented a number of cost-saving initiatives in health care. Health Minister Kelvin Goertzen recently explained because health care consumes almost half of the provincial budget, they're constantly looking for efficiencies.

However, Goertzen has indicated they've finished with all major announcements regarding changes in the delivery of health care in Manitoba

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