16 October 2019

The prices growth was also restrained by annually lower costs of internet access services, tuition fees and telephone services.

This year, mortgage interest costs were up on a year-over-year basis with a 7.5% increase reported in September. The gain follows a number of interest rate hikes by the BoC during the period from July 2017 and October 2018.

Meanwhile, the tuition fees fell by 3.6%, marking the first decline in this sector since 1973. In Ontario, the drop reached 8.9% – here the provincial government reduced tuition for the 2019-20 academic year.

At the same time, the average of three measures for core inflation, which excludes volatile gasoline sector, rose to 2.1% following 2% in August. The BoC watches these numbers closely.