The referendum conundrum

After a legal challenge of the validity of the anti-HST petition, where the petition was affirmed, it was sent to a committee of MLAs a couple of weeks ago. Earlier this week, the committee reached a decision: the HST is going to referendum. This looks bad for the Liberals and Gordon Campbell, because it means the HST battle will be protracted, and now has even more potential to damage them further.

Now, note that since Canada and it's provinces operate under constitutional monarchy, power is vested not in the people, but in the crown. Therefore, a referendum is never legally binding on a Canadian government. Of course, this means they can ignore the results of a referendum, but only to their own peril. This is Gordon Campbell's conundrum. Does he respect the wishes of the people?

Well, apparently, he does, as he has announced, sort of, that a simple 50% no vote would move him to abolish the HST. Of course, the definition of "respecting the people" in politics simply means a fear of being voted out.

Now, to his credit, he hasn't flip-flopped on this either. He stated that he believes people will see the benefits of the HST by the time the referendum rolls around and will vote to keep it. In other words, he's going gaga (i.e. his age is finally getting to him).

This is a good time to once again quote that Angus Reid poll. Remember that dismal 12% rating for Gordon Campbell? Well, that would be because of the widespread dissatisfaction with the HST. Apparently currently 70% of the electorate would vote to abolish it, with only 18% support for keeping it. I believe I voiced the opinion that the HST makes economic sense, but it was brought in in a senseless way. People who actually oppose the tax itself might not be in the majority, but coupled with people who didn't like how it was brought in would bring us to the number of 70%. Regardless of why British Columbians oppose the HST, it appears that the overwhelming opinion is that the HST should be abolished, and so the current projection will simply be that "the no vote will take a landslide majority."

However, I cannot as of yet project that the HST will be abolished, otherwise I'd be basing something on the words of a politician, and we all know how wise that would be.