The Herle Burly was created by Air Quotes Media with support from our presenting sponsor TELUS, as well as CN Rail.

Welcome back to our semi-regular feature here on The Herle Burly, called “The Chiefs”. The Chiefs is a panel of 3 former Chiefs of Staffs to some of Canada’s most accomplished heads of government:

Ian Brodie – first Chief of Staff to Stephen Harper, and central to the founding of the CPC. Now … Professor of Political Science at the University of Calgary.

Tim Murphy – former Chief of Staff to Paul Martin … now CEO and Managing Partner at McMillan LLP.

Brian Topp – former Chief of Staff to Rachel Notley in Alberta … Deputy Chief to Roy Romanow in Saskatchewan … and one of the architects of Jack Layton’s Orange Wave, federally. Today, he’s a founding partner at GT&co.

Today’s discussion is prompted by the upcoming federal budget. We’re going to talk about how exactly a budget gets put together. Where do the ideas come from? What are the roles of the PMO? The PCO? Finance? Cabinet? Caucus? … in the budget process? What should the purpose of a budget be? And what does it represent, writ large? Then we’ll switch gears and get The Chiefs’ impressions of what the government should be thinking about as it prepares this budget.

Thank you for joining us on #TheHerleBurly podcast. Please take a moment to give us a rating and review on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts or your favourite podcast app.