Premier (and former premier) Christy Clark owes her job to the HST and her job loss to the HST.
British Columbians will remember back in 2010 when Gordon Campbell made the incredible decision to stand for the harmonized sales tax against virtually the entire electorate. They will remember when his approval rating fell to nine per cent (the lowest of a Western leader in polling history). They will remember how he went on TV and threw a Hail Mary, trying to bribe British Columbians with an income tax reduction if they would only allow his corporate backers to fleece them for over $2 billion a year with the HST.
Rumour has it that his polling numbers collapsed completely after that and his caucus abandoned him. He was forced to resign in disgrace.
Enter Clark, former education minister turned radio talk show host. While running for leader of the moribund Liberal party, she said if British Columbians didn't want the HST, then the will of the people should be respected.
Of course, that didn't stop her from trying her own Hail Mary for the tax after she won the leadership, making a convoluted promise to reduce the HST over three years, ignoring the fact it would still cost British Columbians more than $1 billion a year in new taxes. Also ignoring the reality that her government might not even be there to complete the cuts, since an election was due before the three-year plan was complete.
She did this because we were told all of the economists said that to remove the tax would result in economic calamity. Jobs would be lost, businesses would close, exports would be hurt and the government would incur massive debt.
For the past four years, the Clark government has run surpluses. The B.C. economy has boomed. B.C. has led all Canadian provinces in job creation and economic growth. Maybe getting rid of the HST wasn't so bad after all?
But some people just can't enjoy their success, can they?
You'd think Clark would have realized she wouldn't even have become the premier in the first place if her predecessor hadn't had to step down over his stubborn refusal to kill the HST.
You'd think she would have understood that the only reason she won the subsequent election was because voters were able to vent their anger over the tax in a referendum, instead of in an election. (Every federal and provincial government in Canada that brought in a GST/HST was defeated in the next election. The only exception being Ontario where their bumbling Tory opposition leader was foolish enough to support the tax, and lose the election).
You'd think Clark would have understood that the last thing the people of B.C. wanted was the HST. But there she was, two weeks before election day, promising to bring it back again! Of course, it was different this time (it always is, right?)
This time a distinguished panel of economic experts had convened a tax review and determined it would be good for British Columbians to have a Value Added Tax (VAT). As Christy explained, just before her polling lead collapsed, a VAT is different than an HST.
A VAT is the same thing as an HST and everyone knows it. In fact, that was the argument the B.C. Liberals used to try to sell it to us the first time! See how well the VAT/HST worked in Europe, they told us.
But now a VAT was different. Better. Not as costly. More job creation. More economic activity. Same arguments they used with the HST.
Well, British Columbians didn't buy it. And even though Clark tried to walk it back before the vote, it was too late. The bottom fell out and she never recovered, ultimately losing the election to a dangerous coalition of NDP/Green that have even less of a clue how to run an economy than she did.
Thanks a lot, Premier Clark. The HST made you and it broke you. And as always, British Columbians will pay the price.
-- Chris Delaney, Barriere
