Taxpayers are angry
Tuesday, June 15, 2010 at 10:33AM Who would have thought that the HST agreements reached between the Federal government and British Columbia and Ontario would have stirred up so much trouble.
Skilful manipulation by provincial opposition parties has certainly stoked the anger, but there is a warning here for all levels of government- raise taxes at your peril!
Voters are simply fed up. They are tired of seeing their hard earned tax dollars squandered (think G8 and G20) and they are tired of being lied to (think McGuinty’s promise that the HST would be revenue neutral and Campbell saying they had no plans to introduce the HST).
Canadians are carrying heavy personal debts, they are coming off a recession that hurt their life savings and now they want a respite. Canadians want a chance to recover, a chance to build up their equity again. The last thing they want to see is more of their money going to governments.
Their anger over the costs of the G8/G20 is real. Their anger over the HST is real. Just wait until residents of Ontario fuel up their cars on the long Canada Day weekend and see how angry people get.
That anger will be expressed in many different forms. Do you remember those federal election platforms that wanted national recall legislation and referendum legislation? Well, depending on your view of the political world, we now see the folly or benefit of recall legislation in BC as voters react to the HST. Even the Premier is not safe this time and expectations are that other members of Campbell’s caucus will follow the former finance minister and depart to sit as independents. It remains to be seen if a province wide referendum will be held. Either way the people have spoken and they are saying enough is enough.
While Stock Day twists arms to save money and make the federal government more efficient, another arm of the same government spends a billion dollars on a few days of chats and photo ops! And they wonder why people are upset?
The federal government is lucky that MPs will get out of town this Thursday for their summer recess. They will be hoping that taxpayers will have almost three months until September 20th to calm down. I am betting that they are wrong. Taxpayers will be just as angry in September as they are now.
Reader Comments (7)
If the bureaucratic savings we were promised were real, I might be OK with the HST. If the simplifications for businesses were real, I might be OK with the HST. The big problem is that there really could be such savings if the HST was implemented properly, but sadly, that's just not turning out to be the case.
We really should be able to do away completely with the provincial department that administers RST without significant incremental work for the feds. If the HST works basically the same way as the GST, the processing of returns and auditing of taxpayers by the feds should be exactly the same as before, just without the need for a provincial auditor to also check RST. So why did the feds need to hire all of the Ontario RST auditors to the federal payroll? There shouldn't be anything extra to audit. Same documents being checked, just a higher rate used!
If the HST was implemented nationally with a common rate across all provinces and no exceptions from province to province in how the HST is applied (such as it is in NF, NB and NS), then I could see how this could be simpler for business. But Ontario has already come out with some "exceptions" to supposedly ease the burden on the taxpayer. But each exception that makes the applicability of the tax different by province takes away from the whole simplification argument. With BC setting their HST rate at 12% instead of the 13% used in the other provinces, businesses still need to have systems to manage tax at different rates depending on the province of sale, so again, where is the simplification?
If we're going to do HST, then we need to do it right on a simple national basis, where we really can enjoy some bureaucratic and administrative savings, or we shouldn't even bother to try.
Well if Canadian's anger is real, then Canadians need to 'get real'.
BC and Quebec residents are the most demanding of free public services in this country, and the loudest bitchers about governments.
Make up your mind!
Do you want the goodies and higher taxes,
or do you want lower taxes and less freebies.
You can NOT have both.
Free healthcare is not free.
Junkies getting free supervised drug injections is not free.
Keeping Canada a free country is not free.
Welfare for the 'most vulnerable' is not free.
Protecting our forests, lakes , air and land is not free.
Highways, bridges and government service buildings are not free.
Employment insurance for workers who voluntarily go on strike is not free.
I am as mad as everybody but let's face it, we wanted big government to protect us and we let them control us. They were supposed to work for us and now we work for them (more that 6 month of earning). That's the way it is and it is not by complaining now that will change something. Most of you will completly forget when voting next time or will swallow all lies during the next campain. We are not part of the solution but part of the problem.......
Most people in Ontario are willing to give up some things. Unfortunately, Dalton wouldn't stand up for the taxpayer against public sector unions. Declining school enrolments would have provided large savings in teachers salary, school building costs etc..But no, we have to provide full time day care now to preserve 90,000 dollar a year (senority and masters deg.) teachers as glorified baby sitters for full time JK. One example ...hundreds of millions in savings.
Everyone needs to write and call their MP and let them know in spades that the G8/G38 Billion Dollar boundoggle is not acceptable. I for one am going to vote for anyone but the liberals or the conservatives and I'm a conservative. What we have not however are not conservatives but liberals in conservatives clothing.
Once the bureaucrats get their hands on any new legislation. They tend to expand their union based group to justify administering the new rules, law, legislation, or whatever.These people tend to live in a world of their own, without the cares and tribulations of everyday surviving life. Overpaid salaries and pensions that ordinary Canadians can only dream of havng. So the big question is, How do we expect a new H.S.T. to benefit us?? . It Won,t. WE will be at the mercy of big government, bureaucrats, and greedy big bussiness which will see no reason to give us a break at the tll. Any tax break goes into big bussiness pockets.Big goverment is on their side not ours. At present we have no prospect of a HST in Manitoba for the present. We do have an election coming up within a year, so if the present government gets in again I wonder how long it will take them before they go for the HST. They have rejected it for the present time.
Steve and his gang will be thrown out in the next election.
I cannot wait to see how the audit of the AG will show us the real rape of the public purse by many over the past several years.
Never ever again will I vote Tory.
A BILLION PLUS FOR 2 LOUSY MEETINGS.GiVE ME A BREAK