Report

Planned Capital Spending under Canada’s Defence Policy: 2025 Update

Oct 29, 2025

This report analyzes planned capital spending by the Department of National Defence under Canada’s defence policy, Our North, Strong and Free, with updates current to June 2025.

Highlights

With the April 2024 release of *Our North, Strong and Free: A Renewed Vision for Canada’s Defence*, the Department of National Defence (DND) established a new 20 year planning horizon for capital spending from 2024-25 to 2043-44. The total capital envelope for this period is estimated to be $322.9 billion, with annual spending projected to peak at $25.7 billion in 2030-31.
The increase in planned capital spending reflects the addition of new projects as well as revisions to existing projects under the updated defence policy. The Government’s commitments to meet North Atlantic Treaty Organization spending targets contributes to this increase, though this report does not assess the capital plan relative to those targets.
Preliminary figures indicate capital expenditures of approximately $10.6 billion in 2024-25, suggesting that DND has started to increase spending toward planned levels. For 2025-26, total authorities requested under Vote 5 remain below planned capital spending, indicating that additional authorities may be required.
Over the period 2017-18 to 2023-24, actual capital spending fell short of planned amounts by a total of $18.5 billion.