Home

HSTSyndicate content

in his own words

British Columbia's HST fiasco

Did Finance Minister Kevin Falcon or any of the Liberals learn anything from the HST referendum?

Premier Christy Clark promised that the referendum would take place just like a normal election, but she then allowed third-party advertisements without disclosure. We'll never know how many millions were spent on trying to convince people to vote for the HST, but we know the government spent $7 million. It wasn't just the advertising campaign that failed any reasonable test of transparency; information provided by the government and its "independent panel" couldn't be verified. One of the lessons the Liberals should learn from their HST failure is that transparency is essential in order to earn public trust.

embedded_video

Tags:
Kevin Falcon HST gordon campbell christy clark british columbia anti-HST

Goodbye Campbell

B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell on the radio during the 2009 B.C. election campaign. Photo: Stephen Dyrgas/Flickr
When general dislike becomes the issue...

Related rabble.ca story:

Goodbye Campbell
Tags:
HST gordon campbell british columbia basi-virk
for the sake of argument

Fuelling the tax revolt: What is wrong with the NDP's anti-HST campaign

The Canadian New Democratic Party (NDP) has devoted much of its energy in recent months to opposing the implementation of the Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) in Ontario and British Columbia. The new taxes came into effect on July 1, 2010. The HST merges the Goods and Services Tax (GST) with the Provincial Sales Tax (PST) in both provinces. Items covered by the GST that were previously exempt from the PST are included under the new HST.

Much of the Canadian left has been supportive of the anti-HST campaign on the grounds that consumption taxes are regressive (i.e. people pay the same rate of tax regardless of income).

embedded_video

Tags:
taxation Ontario HST Economics BC anti-HST
Redeye
Redeye

B.C.'s regressive tax shift

November 6, 2011
| A recent report shows that the wealthy pay a lower overall provincial tax rate than the average citizen in B.C.

16:21 minutes (14.97 MB)
Columnists

Progressive public policy in the Ontario election

We will probably be parsing who won Tuesday's leaders' debate until provincial election day. But thank Ford, it looks like progressives have a good shot at winning, one way or another.

Hudak has lost momentum, and it certainly appears that the Liberals, alone or with the NDP, will form the next government and the NDP will likely double its seat count.

But as we head to the polls, the irony is that whenever lefties gather these days, someone asks whether it's the NDP or the Liberals who are the most progressive party running in this election.

Tags:
Ontario Politics Ontario election ontario government ondp NDP Andrea Horwath Dalton McGuinty party platform HST green energy tim hudak progressive vote

Related items

related_item1

Horwath wins Ontario debate: MSM miss the boat

related_item1_desc

The mainstream media are telling us the Ontario election debate was a wash, with no clear winner. But a quick look at Ipsos-Reid's post-debate poll tells a different story.

related_item2

The Ontario NDP platform

related_item2_desc

Pollsters tell us that Ontario's New Democrats may double their seat total in next month's provincial election. But what's actually in the party's election platform?

related_item3

Tim Hudak's troubled geometry

related_item3_desc

The Ontario election is in full swing, and the Conservative party's campaign is guided by a platform booklet called the "changebook," an audacious manifesto for significant change in the province.
in his own words

Voters in B.C. reject HST regime promoted by big business

Voters in British Columbia delivered a slap in the face to big business interests by rejecting a consumption tax that would shift billions of dollars of taxes from corporations onto consumers. Fifty-four per cent of voters, 881,200, said "no" in a mail-in referendum ballot. The result was announced on Aug. 26.

The Harmonized Sales Tax provoked much protest after it morphed from a secretive federal/provincial government plan in 2008/09 into law on July 1, 2010. In the lead-up to the May 12, 2009 provincial election, the incumbent Liberal Party denied rumours that an HST was in the offing. Within weeks of its election victory, it announced a sudden and unforeseen change of heart.

embedded_video

Tags:
HST corporate tax cuts british columbia anti-HST

The real impact of HST's defeat on provincial finances

By Iglika Ivanova
| September 12, 2011

On Sept 8, Finance Minister Kevin Falcon released a much anticipated update on provincial finances.

The Minister's presentation focused on highlighting the cost of the move back to PST/GST, providing some large numbers for the media headlines, instead of looking at the big picture.

In case you missed the media coverage, the provincial coffers are projected to suffer a loss of $2.8 billion over the next three years, relative to the estimates presented in February's Budget 2011. The Ministry estimates that $2.3 billion of the loss is brought about by the HST defeat and the move back to the PST/GST system.

Read more

HST referendum: Was the vote split along income lines?

By Iglika Ivanova
| August 30, 2011

One of the first things I did after the HST referendum results came out was look at how different electoral districts voted. I noticed that West Vancouver, North Vancouver and Point Grey had the highest number of "No" votes (to keep the HST) while Surrey and East Van districts had the highest number of "Yes" votes (to scrap the HST).

Was the vote was split along income lines?

Read more
Canadian Union of Public Employees
HST result a win for tax fairness, says CUPE BC
August 29, 2011 |
The HST was an unfair tax—the wrong tax at the wrong time, introduced in the wrong way.
Tags:
cupe HST tax

So the B.C. HST was defeated. Now what?

By Iglika Ivanova
| August 27, 2011

Yesterday, Elections BC announced the much anticipated HST referendum results. British Columbians have voted to scrap the HST.

The best part about having the results is that now we can move on from the narrow issue of what type of sales tax is better and focus our energies on some of the bigger issues affecting British Columbia.

Since the HST was first announced in the summer of 2009, it has dominated the policy debates in B.C. despite the fact that either way, the tax was going to have only marginal effects on the economy.

Read more
1234next ›last »
Syndicate content