BINDA: BC taxpayers have three simple demands

BC’s last budget was a train wreck for taxpayers. 

Finance Minister Brenda Bailey raised taxes, increased spending and piled billions of dollars in new debt onto the backs of BC taxpayers. The budget was so bad that Bailey received the only failing grade in the country in the Canadian Taxpayers Federation’s annual finance minister report cards. 

Now the BC government is asking British Columbians what they want to see in next year’s budget. The answer from taxpayers is simple: Less wasteful spending, lower taxes and less government debt. 

The CTF was invited to the legislature in Victoria to participate in BC’s budget consultations. We used that opportunity to bring taxpayers’ message directly to the provincial politicians on the finance committee.  

BC taxpayers are already being asked to pay more to cover the bill from bad government. Before politicians take another dime from families or struggling businesses, they need to clean up the mess in Victoria. 

Here are the remarks the CTF delivered right to the committee: 

Ministers shouldn’t be billing taxpayers $6,600 for SUV-limousine services during four-day junkets to the United States. 

We can’t afford to spend $356,000 on three novelty “wood-leather” soccer balls, $165,000 for 1,000 cups of coffee for a publicity stunt, or $370,000 per year for luxury vehicle leases for government executives. 

If a government can’t even find savings on $165 cups of coffee, it’s no wonder British Columbians are overpaying for the big things too. 

Hosting a handful of FIFA World Cup games was supposed to cost $230 million. Now that bill has ballooned to $729 million. The government also wastes hundreds of millions of dollars per year on corporate welfare and handouts to multinationals.    

The government is taking more money from families, then turning around and doling that money out through corporate welfare.  

This government announced a brand-new corporate welfare slush fund that will cost taxpayers $400 million. At the same time, Budget 2026 raises the lowest income tax bracket on British Columbians. That tax hike will cost us $470 million this year. 

So our second recommendation is for government to cancel the tax hikes included in Budget 2026.  

This government is hiking taxes on average families by 16% this year. A two-income family of four making $100,000 per year is paying $450 more toward provincial taxes this year compared to last. 

You are taking $450 more from that family. That’s a week’s worth of groceries or four full tanks of gasoline the government has taken from that family. 

The government is driving business and job creators away through tax hikes. Architects, security guards, engineers, accountants and geologists are being driven from our province through PST hikes that make BC a less competitive place to do business. 

The PST on professional services will cost taxpayers $1.36 billion over the next three years. That makes BC more expensive. 

Our province has lost nearly 60,000 private-sector jobs in the first five months of this year. This government is squeezing families and chasing away jobs through tax hikes. 

And that brings us to our third recommendation. Government must stop recklessly piling debt onto British Columbians’ backs. 

This government has driven up per capita debt by 95% in the past five years. Every British Columbian will owe $41,000 by 2028. Interest alone on the debt is costing us $6.5 billion this year. It’s now the third biggest line item in the budget. 

Big debt is why credit rating agencies like S&P Global warn that we have the worst budgetary performance of peers not just in Canada, but internationally too. 

Taxpayers have three simple demands: end wasteful spending, cancel the tax hikes, and stop the debt avalanche. 

Carson Binda is the BC Director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.