PRESS RELEASE: Fight HST petition meets 10% threshold in 83 of 85 Ridings
May 25, 2010 Press Release
Point Grey and Quilchena hit 10% with 6 weeks still to go.
Port Coquitlam – Fight HST Lead Organizer, Chris Delaney, says the petition to repeal the HST has crossed the Elections BC 10% threshold in 83 of 85 ridings with over 6 weeks still to go in the campaign.
Delaney says the Fight HST internal threshold of 15% or more has been reached in 57 of 85 ridings.
“These numbers are particularly exciting, since they represent only 64 of 85 ridings reporting. Many areas of the province that had reached their targets took a break for the long weekend. We’ll finish up the remaining two ridings next weekend, and will meet both the Elections BC requirement of 10% as well as our own internal threshold of 15% in all ridings by the first or second week of June,” said Delaney.
Tags: bill vander zalm, british columbians, campaigns, canadian history, chris delaney, critical mass, first premier, mr campbell, petition, point grey, prime minister, prosperity, provincial election, quilchena, referendum, servant, taxpayers, threshold, time and money, youth forum
PRESS RELEASE: Fight HST petition breaks 400,000 signatures in five weeks. Eight weeks left to go.
May 10, 2010 Press Release
56 of 85 ridings hit 10% threshold.
Port Coquitlam – Fight HST lead organizer, Chris Delaney, reported today that the Bill Vander Zalm petition to repeal the HST has hit the 400,000 signature mark as of Monday, May 10th.
Delaney says the petition has achieved the 10% Elections BC threshold in 56 out of a total of 85 ridings across the province. He says that 34 ridings have reached the Fight HST internal threshold of 15% of registered voters or more.
“What is really exciting about this report is the big jump in signatures in both Vancouver and Burnaby this week. We were a little slow getting started in those ridings, but they are catching up quickly, with signature gathering in those regions keeping pace with all other regions now,” said Delaney. Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: chris delaney, do the right thing, elections, finance minister, government purchases, hansen, keeping pace, last provincial election, legal petition, public opinion, referendum, registered voters, rejection, signature mark, signatures, threshold, vancouver
PRESS RELEASE: HST not a done deal until British Columbian’s decide, says VanderZalm
May 2, 2010 Press Release
Terminating agreement with Ottawa will not be difficult
Delta – The leader of the Initiative petition to repeal the HST, Bill Vander Zalm, says despite the BC Government’s attempts to sell the HST as a “done deal”, nothing could be further from the truth.
“They said the HST was a done deal when they signed the agreement with Ottawa nine months ago. Then they said it was a done deal in December when Ottawa passed the federal legislation in Parliament. Now, they’re saying it is a done deal with the legislation removing the PST this past week. But what they aren’t telling people is that what can be enacted by government, can be repealed,” Vander Zalm explained.
Vander Zalm says that the BC Liberal strategy has been to spread the passage of the HST out as long as they can to try to head off Fight HST’s attempts to stop it. Vander Zalm says his group anticipated this tactic, and that is why his petition is designed to “repeal” the tax once enacted, rather than trying to prevent it up front.
Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: bc government, bill vander zalm, british columbians, canadian history, delta, democracy, federal legislation, harmonized sales tax, HST, initiative petition, nine months, ottawa, parliament, polls, provincial sales tax, Recall, referendum, Repeal, sales tax, saskatchewan, truth, vote
Our three point strategy to defeat the #HST in BC
Apr 10, 2010 Details
1. The Initiative Petition: The first phase of our strategy is to successfully complete the first Citizen Initiative in BC (and Canadian) history by obtaining the required signatures of 10% of registered voters in every riding.
Once that is completed, the government has two options – vote on the legislation proposed by us (The HST Extinguishment Act) or:
Conduct a province wide referendum (Initiative Vote) on the question of extinguishing the HST in BC.
If the government tries to use its majority to vote down the successful initiative petition legislation, we will conduct phase 2 of our plan:
Tags: canadian history, citizen initiative, constituents, constitution act 1867, excise tax act, federal government, HST, initiative petition, injunction, legal challenge, legislation, mla, nova scotia, phase 2, provincial legislatures, referendum, registered voters, signatures, taxation, volunteers
Finance Minister Colin Hansen insists that it’s not about misleading the public
Mar 3, 2010 Guest Posts
Adam Stirling Comment – CFAX 1070 Radio Victoria, Mar 3, 2010
I respectfully disagree…
Minister Hansen announced a new government bid yesterday to try to link the wildly unpopular HST to BC’s health care system
Minister Hansen pledged that every dollar raised from the harmonized sales tax will go towards BC’s cash strapped health care system.
What the minister is reluctant to admit is that every penny that goes into health care from the HST will just be clawed back from some other revenue source. To be clear it will make absolutely no difference. For example if an extra million dollars goes into BC’s health budget by way of the HST, that million will be clawed back from other sources of revenue, such as income tax.
It’s easy to see why the government is doing this however: they are scared. They are scared that the 85 percent of British Columbians that polls tell us are against the tax will rise up and defeat it in the upcoming counter petition and possible referendum.
I asked Minister Hansen on my show yesterday if his government has contingency plans in place should this petition actually succeed and force a referendum which nullifies the HST.
Tags: 1070 radio, bc economy, bc government, British Columbia, british columbians, contingency plans, hansen, harmonized sales tax, health budget, health care system, HST, human shields, income tax, million dollars, petition, public policy, referendum, revenue source, stirling, straight answer
