The rejection of the HST was decisive — more decisive than many observers expected.
While few gave the controversial tax much of a chance, many who follow provincial politics expected it would be a close vote — with the tax losing by three or four per cent, perhaps. Instead, the tax lost by almost 10 per cent.
While many of the comments following the release of the results on Friday focused on what will happen next on the tax front, I’d like to comment on the political ramifications of this resounding defeat.
One of the most interesting things to consider is the geographical distribution of the “yes” and “no” votes. While both Langley ridings rejected the “yes” alternative (going back to the old tax system), the rejection rate was quite narrow in Mary Polak’s Langley riding— with 48.67 per cent of voters ready to go back to the old system. In the entire province, only 25 of 85 ridings showed a majority of voters favouring the HST.
None of those ridings are currently held by NDP MLAs, but many Liberal ridings soundly rejected the HST — notably in Richmond, the ridings bordering Alberta, Maple Ridge, most Vancouver Island Liberal ridings, Penticton, Boundary-Similkameen and Kamloops-North Thompson.
In other words, support for the HST was weak, even among Liberals. This does not bode well for the party in the next provincial election, because the Liberals didn’t win the last election by a massive margin. Any siphoning of support to a resurgent BC Conservative Party, or a decision by former Liberal voters to stay home, will badly hurt the party.
The BC Liberals chose Christy Clark as their new leader, at least in part because she had not been part of the government which brought in the HST. Thus far, she hasn’t seemed able to attract disenchanted Liberals back to the fold, and the HST results are proof positive of that.
It is highly unlikely that Clark will call an election this year, as has been rumoured for months. The Liberals would almost certainly lose, and no premier is going to willingly call an election they expect to lose. Under the fixed election date law, an election isn’t supposed to be held until May, 2013. This will give Clark some time to try to repair the major damage to the ship.
NDP leader Adrian Dix was jubilant about the referendum results, and he should be. Not only was it handily rejected in every single NDP riding, but many ridings that he identifies as possible swing ridings (including Langley) either rejected the HST or approved it by very narrow margins. It was not by chance that Dix appeared in Langley the last week of the referendum campaign. He will be here often, right until the next election is held, because he believes seats like Langley, Vernon, Penticton and others that the Liberals won by smaller margins are vulnerable.
He will also be encouraging John Cummins every chance he gets, because the more viable the Conservatives are as an option for dissatisfied Liberal voters, the better the chances are for the NDP to win the next election.
However, Dix and the NDP must put forward sound tax policies. Given that the HST did produce more revenue than the old system, how will the NDP replace that revenue — or is it prepared to cut services and freeze public sector wages?
