HST Referendum is BC Politics as Usual
The decision to put the BC Harmonized Sales Tax to a referendum, come September 2011, will be seen as a stalling tactic, justice delayed and needless continuing of a saga that should come to a conclusion.
These points have their place.
But BC has a long history of referenda making this one politics as usual. This province has used referenda more than any other province in Canada.
Such direct votes in BC have been held at the municipal level since the 1880s, and not long after that at the provincial level.
BC had a referendum to give women the right to vote in 1916.
BC has had several such votes on booze: In 1916, there was a referendum on prohibition, temperance in 1920, beer by the glass in 1924 and another one on liquor in 1952. British Columbians have certainly considered beer and spirits to be going concerns!
There have been referenda for instituting daylight savings times; 1952 and 1972 saw referendums on setting the clocks back and forward once each year.
For 1937, health care was on the public agenda. British Columbians had a direct vote on instituting a public health insurance scheme. “Are you in favor of a comprehensive health insurance plan progressively applied?” British Columbians went for it. (Ah, but the government did not act on results. It did not proclaim its health insurance legislation into force, ever!).
In 1975, Social Credit leader Bill Bennett promised initiative legislation if elected premier. Fifteen years later, Social Credit passed legislation that would set the wheels in motion for a successful direct vote on bringing recall and initiative to BC.
BC’s comfort with direct democracy has influenced federal politics. Premier Bill Vander Zalm’s Constitutional Amendment Approval Act was one factor forcing a national referendum on the Charlottetown Accord. British Columbians rejected this attempt to change the Constitution more than any other province.
No doubt Vander Zalm will be hoping for a similar outcome with the HST vote. But apart from being some big political crisis or happening, this referendum is just another example of politics as usual in BC.
See also: What’s Missing from the BC HST Debate (blog post); Survivor MLA Trivializes BC Politics (blog post); Would You Rather Be Recalled or Eat Rotten Fish? (blog post); Opinion 250 interview with this blog author
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