CRFA's British Columbia Lobbyist
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Mark von Schellwitz Vice President, Western Canada T: 1-866-300-7675 E: mark@crfa.ca |
Re: HST REFERENDUM VOTE
June 22, 2011
Dear CRFA Member:
Over the next few weeks you are being asked to vote on whether or not to extinguish the HST, and we know that you are being inundated with messages from both sides of the HST referendum debate.
To be clear, as your non-partisan association, our job is not to tell you how to vote – that is your choice – but we will continue to speak up on your behalf.
As you know, the HST established a new 7% tax on restaurant meals that extended the unfair tax treatment of food.
The advantages and risks of voting to extinguish HST are as follows:
- Shift of tax from consumers back to businesses will give consumers more disposable income and possibly more discretionary spending for restaurant meals;
- Sales tax authority for sales tax exemptions would revert back to the province;
- However, there is no guarantee that restaurant meals will be exempt from a new PST or that the new PST rate would not be increased to make up for lost HST revenue and the costs associated with re-establishing PST.
The advantages and risks of voting to keep HST are as follows:
- The new tax on restaurant meals will be reduced to 6% in 2012 and 5% in 2014;
- You will continue to get input tax credits for the tax paid on all your non-food and non-labour purchases;
- However, there could be other tax increases to make up for HST revenue lost due to the drop in rate.
Clearly, there are negative implications and risks for our industry either way. CRFA’s question to parties on both sides of the debate is: who is standing up for the restaurant industry? And where is the vision that will allow businesses in one of the province’s largest economic sectors to grow and prosper?
Regardless of the outcome of the referendum, you can be certain that these are questions that CRFA will continue to ask of all politicians in British Columbia. In the meantime, I encourage you to vote in the referendum and make your views known.
Yours sincerely,
Garth Whyte
President and CEO