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PrintFive reasons why Premier Gordon Campbell is bringing in the HST
Sometimes, I wonder if the B.C. Liberal government's plan to introduce the harmonized sales tax is a bit of diabolical trickery.
Surely, Premier Gordon Campbell and Finance Minister Colin Hansen are aware that the introduction of the GST led to the obliteration of the Progressive Conservative Party in the 1990s.
Why would the B.C. Liberals extend a seven percent provincial sales tax to a bunch of services, including restaurant meals and movie tickets, considering what happened to the Progressive Conservatives under Kim Campbell's leadership in 1993?
The B.C. NDP has already collected more than 11,000 signatures on its on-line petition opposing the HST. It's a sign that this political brushfire is far from contained.
Here are five theories why Gordo might have decided to go ahead with the HST (written with a smile):
1. Gordo knows that the NDP will unite behind its leader to fight the HST. That means Carole James will get a reprieve, and lead the party into the next election. Gordo probably thinks he can whip the NDP a fourth time under these circumstances.
2. Gordo is so thick-headed that he actually thinks the public will believe him when he says the HST is revenue-neutral.
3. Gordo is so desperate to have a balanced budget when the boys from the IOC roll into town that he's willing to kill his party's chances in the 2013 election. The feds' $1.6-billion signing bonus for harmonizing federal and provincial sales taxes was an irresistable lure.
4. Gordo is so thick-headed that he thinks Canwest media and publishing baron David Black will support him no matter what, even when he introduces a tax that clobbers their industry. Here's how: the publishers will lose their PST exemption on newsprint, and they'll have to charge HST on advertising. Gordo forgot the old political maxim that you shouldn't pick fights with people who buy ink by the barrel. Once the ethnic media figure this one out, the B.C. Liberals are going to be in for a really rough ride.
5. Gordo's big campaign donors in the forest and mining industries wanted this badly. Keep in mind that one of the beneficiaries is Jimmy Pattison, who's a big investor in Canfor Corp. and whose grocery chain will reap the benefits of a restaurant industry on the ropes. So what if a bunch of family-owned ethnic restaurants go down the tubes. Those guys don't make political donations, anyway. There are bigger players to protect.
Comments
When El Gordo "privatized" BC Ferries automatically the fares went up by 7% to pay the GST. Of course Carole James in her abysmal campaign never once brought this up.
Perhaps if the Straight had devoted less than 90% of its coverage boosting the Green campaign, that 2% vote difference that reelected the Gordo might have swung the other way and we wouldn't be facing this and a myriad of other Neocon schemes.
seth
We didn't recommend a Green candidate in a single constituency where the NDP was competitive. In fact, we warned people on this site that Adrian Dix could have trouble getting reelected if too many people voted Green in Vancouver-Kingsway. We recommended Kathy Corrigan, who won narrowly. We recommended Vicki Huntington, who won narrowly. And we recommended Mike Bocking, who lost narrowly. We might have given more coverage to the NDP if the party had delivered its leader to our office in time to meet our deadlines. But this wasn't a priority for Gerry Scott and the NDP campaign. Jane Sterk and Gordo dropped by for interviews in time for our deadlines. The NDP campaign couldn't be bothered because it had more important things to do, like sending the leader to FM radio stations to spin records. Maybe if she had come by, we might have done a cover story on her.
SMBs
I'd rather not vote for the Liberals again, but there's no alternative. I'm not in a union or pro-poverty, so the NDP are out. Greens would be good if they were fiscally conservative, but they're untested. So I have no choice but to re-elect the Liberals.
In fairness, though California is in much rougher shape because they can't raise taxes so they have to cut services.
I don't believe the Straight itself was editorially biased overtly to the Greens and I agree that James ran a poorly thought out, poorly managed, poorly organized and disastrous campaign.
What I did notice was all through the campaign there were overwhelming numbers of "op-ed" commentaries from Green party candidates relative to the excellent commentaries from you and other Straight staffers and "op-ed" from other parties. Perhaps you invited BCLiberal and NDP candidates to comment but they never took you up on it.
seth
A second bit of trickery is that after three years the government will have amassed over 3 billion dollars in extra revenue from the HST tax increase. Likely there will be plenty of monetary largessev to spread aeround to Liberal oriented groups for the 2012 election.
Silly comment I know, but it really is that simple isn't it?
It'll cost more for Gordon to buy that extra drink which will keep him from driving while intoxicated again.
Think back to Expo 67 in Montreal and their Olympics.... The debt was so massive that Canada started a Lottery to pay off that bill.
Now,42 years later we find ourselves being fleeced for every dollar the government can get!
Look at all the cut-backs, user fees, new tolls and whatever else the can dream up to siphon the money from all British Columbians..
We will never know the true cost of the "Owe-lympics", just as we will never know how badly we got screw'd on the BC Rail deal!
Just remember, when a politician's lips are moving, he's probably lying!
Thank you...
What I find so disgusting in all of this is that consumption taxes are regressive. Simply put, poor people will pay a larger proportion of their income on items that will no longer be PST exempt. This includes basic necessities such as electricity and phone service. Maureen Bader may argue that this is fair, but in my opinion, for people on a fixed or low income, it is not. I also refuse to believe the rhetoric that companies will pass on their tax savings to consumers. Why would they do that rather than increase their profits?
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