Provincial budgets do not go through the house of commons there is a liberal majority in Ontario right now so they can do what ever the F they want and there is shit all we can do except write letters...."hand write" letters and mail them to your MPP also send a copy to the PM and Finance Minister......yes snail mail...emails can get "lost" where as hand written and mailed letters have to be replied to.
Just wanted to add some liberal lovers like to argue it was Mr. Harper & Flaherty who pushed harmonizing these taxes on Ontario when that isn't the whole story......McGuinty wants to spend spend spend and was told he would get no new money from Ottawa for his budget and to find a way to make his budget work he was told to find another way to fund all his spending sprees he wants to go on so this is what he came up with in true lieberal fashion.
Harper wants the tax harmonized so we don't need a huge office building full of employees to administer GST and another one for PST what Harper wanted to do is make it all under one roof to cut spending and free up money for other projects he also said the harmonized tax should not put extra burden on Ontario residence.
Anyone who tries to put this on the CPC is completely delusional.
TheStar.com | Ontario Budget | Blended sales tax next year
Robert Benzie and Rob Ferguson
Queen's Park Bureau
Ontarians will be paying a harmonized 13 per cent single sales tax as of
July 1, 2010, the Star has learned.
Today's provincial budget will unveil the blending of the 8 per cent provincial sales tax with the 5 per cent federal goods and services tax.
To soften the blow of slapping the full new tax on scores of items now PST-exempt – from fast-food value meals to home heating fuels – the Liberal government plans a slew of consumer-friendly measures.
Families earning less than $160,000 a year will get three cheques totalling $1,000 annually to offset the higher prices. Single people will get lesser relief.
Sources said last night that children's clothing, diapers, feminine hygiene products, books, child car seats and boosters, and new homes costing less than $400,000 will continue to be subject only to the 5 per cent federal GST.
Buyers of houses costing $400,000 to $500,000 would receive a partial tax credit. But new homes that cost more than that would be taxed at the full rate.
The federal government has been pressing Premier Dalton McGuinty to make the tax change, and sources said he has successfully held out for billions of dollars in federal financial assistance to help mitigate the impact on consumers.
McGuinty is girding to face the wrath of voters in a 2011 election campaign that potentially will feature the single sales tax as the key ballot question.
Boasting that he would not emulate former prime minister Brian Mulroney – who imposed the GST in 1991 and quit two years later, leaving a political mess for his successor – McGuinty vowed to seek a third term.
"I'm running again," the premier told reporters yesterday, insisting he's not afraid of a tax backlash from the public. "I'm going to do what needs doing."
With opposition critics thundering that everything from Big Macs to mansions will cost more after McGuinty blends the taxes, the government could be in for a rocky time through the October 2011 vote, despite its conviction the change will help hard-hit businesses.
Many industries favour harmonizing the taxes because the PST would be removed from manufacturers' purchases of machinery, equipment and other items not subject to the GST.
But interim Progressive Conservative leader Bob Runciman called the premier "a serial promise breaker" for moving forward with a tax measure that will pinch the wallet of every Ontarian at the same time that jobs are disappearing.
Runciman pointed out McGuinty promised in the 2003 election campaign not to raise taxes, then imposed a health premium of up to $900 per person to cover rising health costs the following year.
"You intend to once again break a solemn promise and impose new taxes on struggling Ontario families through tax harmonization," the Tory leader said in the Legislature.
NDP Leader Andrea Horwath charged that "the McGuinty Liberals are inviting Ontarians to celebrate their `8 per cent more' event."
"That's 8 per cent more to heat their home ... 8 per cent more for the corner hot dog, even 8 per cent more to take the family dog to the vet," said Horwath.
McGuinty said the budget would not cut essential government services, but that the province will be doing additional belt-tightening.
The budget, to be unveiled by Finance Minister Dwight Duncan this afternoon, will also include:
• $27.5 billion in new funding over the next two years for public transit, roads, schools, hospitals and long-term care as a way of improving infrastructure while creating or supporting 300,000 jobs.
• An increase in the maximum child benefit to $92 per month per child from $50, helping 960,000 of Ontario's poorest children in 465,000 families.
• $620 million to match federal financing to renovate 50,000 social housing units and build 45,000 new affordable homes.
• Allocating the unspent $105 million in the much-ballyhooed $135 million plan to provide dental care for the working poor, an initiative inspired by a 2007 Star series.
• A long-term deficit-reduction plan.
The single sales tax will be the most contentious part of the record $100 billion budget, which will include a combined $18 billion deficit for the fiscal year just ending and for 2009-10.
Mindful of the political cost of imposing taxes on PST-exempt items, McGuinty was scrambling to ease concerns yesterday.
Sources said he was calling a variety of groups to allay fears about the impact of a harmonized sales tax similar to that now in place in Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. The Nova Scotia Liberal government that blended its taxes in 1997 was defeated in 1999, which has Liberal MPPs very worried about the next election.
"A value-added tax, by definition, shifts the burden from business to consumers. It's really about who are the winners and who are the losers. We will be the losers," said Stephen Dupuis, president and CEO of the Building Industry and Land Development Association.
McGuinty's move on a harmonized tax follows a push from federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty.
Flaherty declined to comment on talks with Queen's Park about blending the taxes until the release of the budget this afternoon. But he suggested it's been a priority.
"If you read our budgets from the last four years, you'll see our view on that issue," he told reporters in Ottawa.
In its Jan. 27 budget, the federal government said a harmonized tax with Ontario, along with British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Prince Edward Island, would make businesses in those provinces "more competitive."
Just when u thought Gas prices were down...!
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