By Arthur Weinreb
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
A lot of Canadians complain that we are overtaxed, and yet taxes continue to increase while there is hardly a peep from the compliant taxpayers. It must be that we, as Canadians, just love paying taxes. It often seems that we can never get enough of them.
One only has to look at what is happening now in Ontario where a provincial election is less than two months away. We all know that Premier Dalton McGuinty came to power in 2003 after running on the promise that if elected, Ontarians would not pay "one penny more" in taxes that they had been paying under the Progressive Conservative government of Mike Harris and Ernie Eves. Less than a year after being elected McGuinty imposed a new health tax that he unsuccessfully tried to pass off as a premium and not a tax. McGuinty made no apology for this one of many lies that he told, claiming that he had to do it to make up for the fact that after obtaining office, he discovered a hidden deficit of about $5 billion. So Ontarians who were promised that they wouldn't pay more, had to give over up to 90,000 more of their pennies to the new government at Queen's Park.
Now it has been announced that the Ontario government has ended up with a surplus of about $2.3 billion for the 2006-7 fiscal year. This is just slightly less than the $2.5 billion that the province rakes in every year from the health tax or premium or whatever Dalton wants to call it. The province would be close to having a balanced budget if the government simply refunded the money from the health tax now that there reason for imposing it has been eliminated. According to McGuinty when he made his 2007 version of the same promise (no new taxes) the only reason to break such a promise is a hidden deficit; since there is now a surplus, logic dictates the $2.5 billion or at least $2.3 of it should be given back to the taxpayers.
But no. Immediately after the surplus was announced, Finance Minister Greg Sorbara (aka the Real Premier) announced that the money would not be given back. It will be used for health care and education. And the sheep seem to be perfectly content to have this dishonest and costly tax remain. There should be a lot of outrage but there isn't. In fact the latest polls suggest that Dalton McGuinty and his merry band of tax and spenders are looking at being re-elected albeit with a minority with the NDP appearing to gain at the polls. It doesn't look like the Conservatives, the party that has promised to repeal the health tax are going anywhere, most likely as a result of the PC party's promise to fund religious education that is turning many likely Conservative voters off. There is no political reason why the tax need be given back to the taxpayers who were essentially conned into electing the McGuinty government by their promise of stable taxes.
Sorbara knows enough to use the magic words – health care. Once the voters are told that at least part of the money will be used for health care, they are placated. If we get the money back, we'll get sick and die!!! Governments in Canada can tax citizens any amount and as long as they promise that the money or at least a substantial part of it will go to health care and they will meet very little resistance. We really are a bunch of wusses.
The Liberals are using their surplus, not for education and health care but to buy the next election. But that really doesn't matter; as long as there is a perception that some of it will go towards health care, that's enough for the population to remain quiet about high and higher taxes. This is fine even in spite of the fact that we see where a lot of our money goes; to slush funds to organizations of ethnic groups that no one outside of the Liberal Party of Ontario has ever heard of, to change logos of Crown corporations and $79 million to plant trees in a questionable attempt to save the planet.
We get the governments we deserve and they can tax the populace at will as long as they use the magic phrase – health care.
It is rare to see people strongly react to new or increased taxes like they did when Toronto mayor David Miller tried to pass new taxes. Poor David – if only he could have promised to use the money for health care instead of fixing potholes.
So re-elect Dalton and keep those taxes coming. Remember, the money is going to health care.
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