The Sask. Party’s hypocrisy knows no bounds. It seems they will say anything as long as it fits their narrative no matter what they intend to do later.
For example, in the 2018-19 budget, the Sask. Party reintroduced PST for used vehicles, which is something they campaigned against in the past. Then-premier Brad Wall said, “The government should avoid doing dumb things, and the idea of charging the PST on the same used car over and over again seems pretty dumb.”
Well, even though the Sask. Party thought it was ‘dumb’, they are now adding PST to used cars, and taxing Saskatchewan families even more. The $95 million collected from this taxation will come directly from the pockets of Saskatchewan families and businesses.
The Sask. Party also had a lot to say about taxation on children’s clothes. In 2011, they expanded the PST exemption for children’s clothes for children 17 and under stating, “we made this announcement to make life a little more affordable for Saskatchewan families and today we are keeping our promise”.
Now, the Sask. Party is breaking their promise and discarded the exemption for all kids’ clothes, no matter the child’s age. With the lagging job market and faltering economy, parents are struggling to make ends meet, and this move only makes things worse.
Introducing PST for restaurants used to be something Finance Minister Harpauer petitioned against, saying: “Please do not tax our food.” However, this is yet another flip-flop from the Sask. Party. This taxation has been detrimental to the restaurant industry with sales dropping 4.5 per cent, and 1,700 industry jobs have been lost.
The only explanation for the change from the Sask. Party is that they’ve blown through record revenues and mismanaged the economy. Now they are forcing Saskatchewan families to pay the price no matter how many jobs are lost or how badly it hurts our economy.