By Michael Potestio
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Kamloops This Week
The 2022-2023 provincial budget lacks progress, according to Kamloops-North Thompson MLA and BC Liberal finance critic Peter Milobar.
The opposition MLA said the NDP government’s budget, revealed on Feb. 22 by Finance Minister Selina Robinson, doesn’t do enough to address rising costs of goods, such as gas and groceries, housing and child care.
“Budget 2022 fails to properly address the issues British Columbians really care about — the ones that are on their minds every single day,” Milobar said in a release. “People are looking to the NDP government to solve these problems because they repeatedly promised they would.”
Milobar lamented a lack of development implementing the NDP’s promised $10-a-day child-care program — with government pegging a reduction on the average child care fee to $20 a day by the end of 2022. He also criticized the addition of three new taxes and the fact the Ministry of Mental Health and Addictions is getting an $8 million increase for communications, but not for new treatment beds.
Those new taxes cover sales of used cars, online purchases and home heating systems that use fossil fuels, though there will be tax breaks on purchases of heat pumps and electric vehicles. Government also plans to spend $79 million to continue adding electric vehicle charging systems and to support vehicle pilot projects.
Robinson said $4.4 billion is being spent over the next three years to convert existing child-care spaces and create new ones to the $10-a-day charge.
Milobar also pointed to the lack of a previously promised $400 renters’ rebate, no timeline to balance the budget and its absence of relief for home buyers amidst skyrocketing house prices, from which the government pulled in $3 billion in revenues in 2021.
Kamloops-South Thompson MLA and BC Liberal Opposition House leader MLA Todd Stone said he is disappointed the budget doesn’t address the “affordability challenges” people in B.C. are facing, noting government is adding to those challenges with new taxes.
Stone said people buying and selling second-hand items on sites such as Amazon will be subject to PST and anyone getting a used car for cheap will still have to pay PST based on the the car’s blue book value, regardless of selling price. Immediate family members can still gift vehicles to one another, with no taxes paid.
Stone added that the home heating tax increase on fossil fuels will be a hit to the pocketbook of those using natural gas, which he noted is commonplace in the Interior.
“Once British Columbians tune in and feel the impact of these tax increase, I think there’s going to be a tremendous amount of anger and frustration.” Stone said.
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