You watch...the only thing that will change when the anti HST vote wins, will be the name of the tax.

Who pays the tax, who doesn't and what is taxed under the HST will not change. It will be called the PST and the GST.

The question on the ballot needs to ask,

Are you in favour of extinguishing the HST and reinstating the PST/GST system exactly as it was in its previous form prior to the HST?

This is like a Monty Python skit...

"WE WANT A REFERENDUM, WE WANT A REFERENDUM!"
Ok, here is your referendum
"WE WANT IT SOONER, WE WANT IT SOONER!"
Ok, here the date has been moved up
"WE DONT LIKE HOW ITS WORDED, WE DONT LIKE HOW ITS WORDED"

sigh...

If they would do things the right way in the first place,not as many people would have a reason to bitch.Hold a referendum as they usually are held with people having to get off their duffs to vote.Then their would be no dicrepancies with lost votes,mail etc.Word the thing properly as Dragonmaster stated and you eliminate most of the whining.If they had implemented the HST properly in the first place,we might not be where we are today,with the added costs of the referendum.But they always have to screw up first and then backtrack and fix it.Are we not always being told we should learn from our mistakes,or does that not apply to government either.Thanks for the opportunity for the rant,have a great Friday everyone!

They could just change the names and keep the tax the same, including on those things not taxed under the old GST/PST system, but I doubt that even the Liberals would be that stupid. Doing that would make it absolutely clear they have nothing but contempt for voters, and while that may be true, I am sure they would like to hide it for a little longer, like until after the next provincial election.

There was no referendum when the HST was brought in. Big commotion! Even the Zalm came out of retirement, flanked by his former detractors!

Now there will be the referendum about whether to keep the HST or not. Big commotion! John Cleese would love it!

You asked for it, you got it!

That's it. C'est la vie! Put your check mark in the box of your choice and put the whole package in the mailbox inside the post office! If you choose not to vote, it is o.k. too!

Voila!

So, if the HST is defeated,will everything that wasn't taxed before, go back to the way it used to be?
I doubt that it will,but I notice the Liberals are not talking about that part of it?
Safe to say,the taxpayers will still lose,one way or the other.
This government has proven many times that it cannot be trusted...why would we trust it now when the same monkey's are still running the zoo?
I think we are damned if we do...and damned if we don't.
They got us.

Oh but things WILL change. Provinces are tripping over themselves to adopt the HST because it grants them extraordinary powers to collect tax both federally and provincially. Powers they cannot have under a split system. The kicker? Consumers pay the whole shot.

We will vote against the HST they will go back to calling it the PSt and GST but they won't change what is being taxed, and when we complain they will say "but thats what you wanted" or they will simply add a carbon tax, or an alcohol tax, or a raod tax or whatever you want to call it for the shortfall for what they missed and we will all happily go to the poorhouse while our irreponsible government will continue to tax the balls off ever person who lives in BC. I wonder don't they pay taxes as well? Don;t they realize that they could put more money in their own pockets if they just could find a way to manage a budget without increasing taxes on every available purchase item in the free world? When you break your finger put a splint on it and let it mend, you don't just keep putting bandaids on it hoping it will fix itself..wow.

My guess is that if they are lucky enough to win both the HST referendum AND the next election,they will raise it by about 2%.
They won't say they will not raise it, and that's as good as a yes with these dishonest clowns.
I think they will do it within a year of the election,assuming they win.
And we had also better start remembering who the new Finance Minister is as well.
Kevin Falcon...and he is being very quiet about everything.
If anyone thinks this nasty little man won't sock it to us,then we get what we deserve.

There seem to be a lot of cynical people commenting here, but I take issue with the notion that if the HST is defeated, the level of taxation for consumers won't change.

The BC Liberals are bad, but they're not completely retarded. If a majority of voters strike down the HST, it would be absolute political suicide not to listen to the wishes of the voters after that.

No, they're already on the path to reconciliation with the voters. The tone has seriously changed with the replacement of the leader. They know they have a huge hill to climb before 2013 if they don't want to get completely wiped out.

I guarantee, if the people vote it down, the HST will disappear and we will return to the old system. Hopefully they work on fixing the PST system because it's broken, but we'll return to 5% tax on restaurant meals.

The Liberals couldn't even get their own leadership vote done without contoversy...so we are to think this vote will be handled any better? I for one don't trust them or the system they have selected to use for this vote.
I see too many flaws, all beneficial to the Liberals, and their desire to retain the HST.

Stop worrying about the fallout. There won't be any. Again, let me be clear, the whole reason they want an HST is because they can tax EVERYTHING. If the HST goes, so do their powers to tax EVERYTHING. At first I couldn't figure out how one province could have a 12% tax and the neighbouring province could only charge 5%. Any logical person would purchase all their big-ticket items in the lower taxed province. That is until you realize under the HST, BC can collect on those "unpaid" taxes. Normally, this is not enforced, but in BC we have ICBC as enforcer. Anything you have to register (cars, boats, atv's, sleds) must have ALL taxes paid. This is where HST comes in. The province can forcibly collect taxes they never used to be entitled to. And still aren't entitled to.

The HST question is this: Why pay through the nose so indians and olympic venues can be paid for?

Gamblor is racist! You forgot about all the wellfare cases we pay through the nose for.

When we vote down the HST it will be a job creation move. All the folks that used to work for PST will have to be hired back. I doubt they will give back their severance.
Don't forget about the 2 billion we will have to pay back to Harper or whom ever is elected that they sent us for going with the hst.

Alberta doesn't have pst because of the oil.

BC could collect those taxes before. But it was never policed. We were supposed to be honest and send in the pst portion of our out of province purchases.

This is a huge waste on money and will cost more if we revert to the old way. We have all ready taken the hit so why not just leave it and suck it up? PST will rise to 10% the same day we vote it back in. Some of you should contemplate the possible repercussions before voting against it, just because you're still mad at Campbell. Life ain't fair and it can get worse.

When I vote out the H.S.T. and I will with the understanding that if there is any tax collected the corporations will be paying their fair share. This keeps B.C. liveable even for the average tax payer.

If and when the HST is defeated and the taxation returns to pre HST days we will see if CC really has a families first policy. Will the taxes on private auto sales revert to PST only, will prepared foods have PST only, etc. Only then will we really know the Liberal agenda under CC. Everyone was aware of the Campbell agenda, corporations first and families last. Everyone needs to wary of Kevin Falcon as finance minister. He is just as much a clone of Campbell as Hanson.

"Life ain't fair and it can get worse",oh believe me I know and live that statement almost everyday of my life,as do a lot of other people in the world.The one thing is you have to pick and choose your battles,and this is one of them.If you don't fight for things in life guess what you get,zilch,notta,nothing!

"Oh but things WILL change. Provinces are tripping over themselves to adopt the HST because it grants them extraordinary powers to collect tax both federally and provincially"

Ummm, no it doesn't. First off, the Province doesn't collect the HST, businesses do. Secondly, when businesses remit the HST they collect to the Feds, it eventually gets distributed to both the Feds and the Province based on the specific agreement that is in place between those two.

It amazes me how many people out there don't have a clue about what they are talking about when it comes to the HST. For example, I saw one post Opinion 250 where someone was attributing the lack of business at an appliance store to the HST. The fact is that there wouldn't be a single thing in that store that wouldn't have been subject to PST and HST before. In short, the HST would make NO difference to the consumer for those types of purchases.

For the record, I'm no fan of the HST. My issue with it is the tax shift from big corporations to the consumer. I don't agree with it from a tax policy point of view and I think the economic benefits of the HST as touted by the Liberals are extremely overblown.

IMHO there are some very legitimate reasons to be against HST and those should be the ones being discussed. It doesn't help to use arguments that can be so easily countered because they are simply not true.

Seeing as how I believe it was my post about the appliance store,I will state a fact,of why people may be staying away from some purchases,because of the HST.As you state NMG,I couldn't have a clue as to what I am talking about.I bought a television in Jan.of 09.Taxes (PST)&(GST)came to $95.76.Today,under the HST=$107.52,for a difference of $11.76 in increased cost to the consumer.On top of this we were told by the liberals,that the HST would bring down the prices on the things we purchase,when in fact most prices have increased without the additional cost of the HST.So maybe what I previously said about some businesses being slower,actually has some merit.

jakeadoo, prior to HST you should have paid 7% PST and 5% GST on your TV (or any home electronics or appliances for that matter) for a combined rate of 12%. Under HST you should pay the "one" tax of 12%. No difference on the base price if the TV unless the store screwed up or you bought it at some sort of discount before.

There may be differences on stuff like extended warranties, service plans, installation charges, etc., but the TV itself would not be any different.

Oh and I agree with you about the prices being lower part. I haven't seen any proof of that, that notion seems to be all theoretical on the part of the Liberals.