Richmond came out swinging against the HST, according to the referendum results which were announced today.
In Richmond East, 65.6 per cent of the residents voted yes to scratching the HST; Richmond Centre saw a 63.8 per cent yes vote; Steveston-Richmond was a little less adamant with 55.2 per cent voting yes to scraping the sales tax.
The three ridings together put Richmond in about 22nd place out of 85 ridings in terms of its opposition to the tax with 61.3 voting yes and 38.7 voting no.
Im disappointed with the result, but the people have spoken and I will support Plan B, to move back to the PST/GST program, said Richmond MLA John Yap.
Sasha Peters, a financial advisor, number cruncher and self-confessed political junky, writes a political blog, B.C. 2013, which attempts to illustrate patterns and correlations.
Peters, who has also worked on numerous campaigns in Richmond, including that of Alice Wongs, found that generally ridings that voted yes to scratching the HST had one or more of three characteristics: its an NDP riding, its lower income or its rural.
Richmond fits none of those criteria yet turned on one of the highest yes votes.
Yap said hes not sure why Richmond strongly supported scratching the HST, or if the citys large Asian community was a factor.
But he believes that despite his partys loss, the Liberals campaign was relatively successful.
It ended up closer, considering it began at more of a 80/20 split.
Peters agreed that the Liberals did close the gap somewhat, but that they didnt do themselves any favours in the campaign either.
There was so much spin to the point of being counter productive.
And while it helped that the government offered to lower the percentage by two percent over two years, they could have lowered it by five percent and it wouldnt have helped. People just lost trust and the government looked desperate.
And while the sales tax will be scratched, it wont happen tomorrow, said Yap.
It will take about 18 months for the government to unwind the HST.
In the meantime the government will have to look for other streams of revenue to maintain the services people want, Yap said.
All revenue options have to be reviewed whether it be consumption tax or income tax, but we need to maintain a competitive tax system that how we maintain a competitive economy.
