News and event information for Williams Lake, BC - as it happens.

The first speaker, Eric Freston, reminded the crowd that the BC MLAs would be voting on the HST this month in legislature. He said that during the election, Donna made the Cariboo Chilcotin two critical promises, one of which was to be a strong voice for the Cariboo. “She also made the promise to her constituency that she would put their wishes and concerns above her own, and we have every intention of holding her to that particular promise,” he stated.

He said that there is an 85% disapproval rate in BC of the Harmonized Sales Tax, and that the whole point of the rally was to encourage Donna to vote ‘no’.

Bill Reid spoke next, indentifying himself as a senior and long-time resident in the area. “I was born here in 1930 in the old hospital, right there at the top of the hill, and spent my whole life here in the Cariboo. I lived in Horsefly for 62 years of my life and then moved to Williams Lake for health reasons,” he said.

“I thought it would be ‘easy street’ here, but taxes kept going up, and now there’s the HST---Harmonized Sales Tax. That ‘H’ in there has a very strong smell of horse, to me,” he continued.

There are a lot things that us seniors enjoy doing. Some of us like to golf, some of us like to curl and some of us like to bowl. When you start registering for these things now, the HST is going to gouge you another seven percent.

“My wife and I deliver Meals on Wheels as volunteers, and after we do our deliveries on Friday, we like to go out to lunch ourselves. That’s going to be another seven percent.

“A lot of people would say that we don’t need to do those things. No, we don’t need to do them but, my goodness, we’ve worked hard all our lives and feel that we’re entitled to enjoy ourselves now that we’re seniors.

“Telephone bills are one of the things that’s going to go up, as well as mechanical work on our vehicles. When it’s all over, funeral prices are going to go up, he said. “Let’s hope our MLA will vote ‘no.’”

Local President of the Steelworker’s Union, Bill Derbyshire, was the next speaker. “The Steelworkers are opposed to the HST. We see this as an unreasonable tax being put on people during tough economical times,” he stated. “We have a couple of major concerns that need to be addressed.

“One is regarding people that rely on the health and medical services. Right now it isn’t taxed under provincial sales tax, but it will be with the HST—that’s going to put a huge burden on people.

“The other concern is the carbon-neutral issue we’re supposed to be looking at. If you go out and buy a bicycle, or need to get one repaired, you will now be taxed,” he continued.

“When you go to a movie or concert, you will be taxed. If you decide to save money and stay home and watch TV, your cable and electricity is now going to get taxed. In a time when we’re struggling economically, we’re adding more on to people who don’t deserve it and don’t need it.

Why are they doing it? The Province is going to get $1.3 billion back from the Federal Government. We have a deficit that’s up around $2.5 billion, and they’re going to try to pay it off,” he explained. “The Olympics that just happened down in Vancouver were great for Vancouver but didn’t do anything for us up here in Williams Lake.

“We have a school system that needs money, we have a health system that needs money, we need to take care of our seniors, and the only thing I want to tell you guys is that you need to take the time to understand what the HST will mean to us in BC, and let your concerns be known to Donna Barnett.”

Dave Ligertwood said that the local NDP group passed out a petition in the fall at various businesses in town. “From that petition we got a local of 4,000 signatures. For a rural riding of this size, where it’s difficult to get everybody together, 4,000 is huge number of people who don’t want this tax,” he said.

“During the last election, the Liberals promised that they would not bring in the HST. The fact is, I’m sure they were in conversation with the Federal Government long before the election happened, discussing the implementation,” he said. “Two months after the election, they announced the HST. To me, you can’t call this incompetence: you call this deceit.”

He said that the Vander Zalm ‘Stop the HST’ initiative wants to deal with the tax after it becomes law. “What we’re saying is, let’s deal with it before it becomes law.”