There's transient debt based spending and permanent debt based spending.

The former follows from Keynesian theory, and the Conservative government followed the theory quite dogmatically - borrowing during severe downturns to prime the economic pump, then eliminating the deficit and repaying the debt during economic boom times.

The current government pitches the need to borrow during relatively good times, then borrows even more as the economy's performance peaks. It follows a well-travelled road towards bankruptcy, exemplified most recently in this country by the current PM's father at the federal level, and his close political colleague Kathleen Wynne at the provincial level.