Anti HST force scores as B.C. judge rules petition is valid and can proceed
A petition signed by more than 700,000 British Columbians angry over the harmonized sales tax is valid, says a judge who urged the province’s chief electoral officer to send the matter to the legislature as soon as possible.
Chief Justice Robert Bauman of the B.C. Supreme Court said Friday that he wasn’t persuaded by objections raised by a coalition of business groups, who argued, among other things, that the province no longer has jurisdiction over the HST because it’s a federal tax.
The petition was spearheaded by former premier Bill Vander Zalm, who is the province’s most vocal critic of the HST and has also launched his own court challenge of the constitutionality of the tax.
“Weighing the balance of convenience and the fact that Mr. Vander Zalm has been successful in the initiative petition and its defence in the court I would respectfully ask the chief electoral officer to perform his remaining duties under the Recall and Initiative Act forthwith,” Bauman said in his written ruling.
Under provincial law, the petition will head to a legislature committee that has two options: send the issue to the legislature for a vote or hold a non-binding referendum next year.
Chief electoral officer Craig James concluded the petitioners collected enough valid signatures but refused to pass the document to the legislature while its validity was before the court.
The Liberal government has come under heavy criticism after announcing its plans to adopt the HST last summer within weeks of a provincial election campaign in which the party said it wasn’t contemplating a tax switch.
The HST blends the seven-per-cent provincial sales tax and the five-per-cent GST, creating a blended 12-per-cent tax that applies to a range of items that had previously been exempt from the provincial sales tax.
The six business groups that filed the court challenge have already said they will not appeal the ruling.
Vander Zalm, who was a Social Credit premier from 1986 to 1991, also plans to launch recall campaigns if the province doesn’t reverse course on the HST.
