British Columbians vote to scrap HST in referendum

by Stephen Hui on August 26th, 2011 at 10:37 AM

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A majority of B.C. voters have rejected the harmonized sales tax in a provincewide referendum.

881,198 people (54.73 percent) voted Yes to reject the HST, and 728,927 people (45.27 percent) voted No.

Elections B.C. released today (August 26) the results of the vote.

The riding with the highest proportion of Yes votes was Surrey-Green Timbers, with 75.51 percent.

Pro-HST sentiment was highest in West Vancouver-Capilano, with 64.52 percent voting No.

More than 1.6 million British Columbians cast ballots in the mail-in referendum.

The outcome of the vote sets the stage for the province to rescind the HST and go back to the PST and GST.

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Comments

21 Comments

Barney Fife

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:24am

You're next BC Liberals.

James G

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:30am

We are still a democracy in spite of all the crap pulled by the BC Liberals over the past decade! Now time to turf them.

City Observer

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:36am

A riding by riding breakdown of the HST vote ... http://is.gd/TRVy9E

GOT

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:42am

This is actually a well-deserved vote of non-confidence in the BC Liberal government. If she has any integrity, Christy Clark should call an election for this fall and see if British Columbians are willing to continue supporting her as premier and her government. If not, then the job of re-organizing the provincial sales tax should be handed to a government that can be trusted to do it properly, meaning NOT turning it into an exercise in punitive politics. In my view, the Liberals have shown time and again that they can't be trusted to do anything properly. Let's demand an election!

sleepswithangels

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:48am

Besides all the lying and other scumbaggery...nobody survives a tax grab on previously exempt bicycles and lives to tell about it in BC.

The BC Liberals can go Fukushima themselves.

Now we get to hear a lot of gasbaggery from those who are so heavily invested as a supporters of this thoroughly corrupt government that they're happy to ignore the fact that the BC Rail scandal is only the tip of the graft iceberg?

That's what happens when mass media in a province runs interference for the BC branch of the Republican Party. All the prime public assets from gas, forests, hydro and medicine have been cherry picked by Republican Party insiders with the obeisance of the BC Lichtspittel Party.
SMBs

Devin

Aug 26, 2011 at 11:54am

Hooray! BC is the next California!!

Arthur Vandelay

Aug 26, 2011 at 12:15pm

Congratulations BC. You've chosen to make our province uncompetitive with 140-odd countries around the world and most of the other Canadian provinces, especially Ontario. The BC film industry will be the first to leave to Ontario, followed by the trickle of others over the years who will either leave or chose not to locate here. Ontario couldn’t be any happier with today’s outcome.
Bottom line is we trusted one group of scoundrels (Campbell and BC Libs) less than another group (Dix, Zalm, Delaney, Tielman).

Yep

Aug 26, 2011 at 12:18pm

Yay, maybe now we can read about something besides Jack Layton.

NoNeoConRightWingNuts

Aug 26, 2011 at 12:53pm

Ha ha Crusty & crew take that up your kilt :)

The Economy did post a $2 Billion Surplus + better Employment under the PST + NDP...haha :)

The Movie Industry et al etc ALL FLOURISHED UNDER THE PST, if they want to leave for CORPORATE WELFARE IN ONTARIO GOOD RIDDANCE THAT IS NOT A SUSTAINABLE MODEL FOR GOVERNMENT OR BUSINESS!!!

Now pressure the Government to stream line the PST and bring it down to 10% combined like the "promise" by the Neo-Cons on the HST to 10%, if they can do that for HST they can do it for PST/GST.

Also get a real resource Tax / Royalties for our natural resources like Norway, Newfoundland, Australia and the UK on North Sea Oil, read up on it.