Some St. Albert seniors want the provincial government to increase taxes.
The idea came up Tuesday at a seniors’ forum hosted by Alberta Liberal leader David Swann and Calgary MLA Dave Taylor. About 160 seniors filled the St. Albert Community Hall for what turned out to be a boisterous anti-Tory complaining session.
The dominant complaint was that the province’s poor financial management is contributing to the ruin of the health care system. A number of seniors suggested that Alberta could take a page from Norway’s playbook by saving rather than spending its resource revenue. St. Albert resident Ray Rohr, 68, was the first to utter the T-word, suggesting Alberta could save more of its resource revenue if it collected more through taxes.
“If you look at Norway, they don’t advertise zero sales tax and the lowest income taxes in Europe,” Rohr said. “Sales tax is not a taboo.”
Rohr travels globally as an aviation and management consultant and said he feels fortunate if he hits a country that charges less than 15 per cent sales tax.
“Most of it is 17 per cent and I’m hitting 20 in some countries,” he said. “We, with five per cent here, have our heads so deep in the sand, it’s irresponsible.”
In a later interview, Rohr said he doesn’t expect any party to promote a sales tax as a policy but he thinks the province needs to review its finances to ensure they are sustainable.
“All I’m saying is I think it’s time that all of Albertans have a serious discussion on our long-term financial structure and we do it in a manner that there are no taboos,” he said.
At the forum, Rohr’s thoughts drew hearty applause from those gathered but Taylor, who is his party’s finance critic, tried to throw cold water on the enthusiasm.
“I don’t necessarily disagree with what you said about the sales taxes, except for one teeny-tiny little problem,” he said. “It seems that a provincial sales tax is politically unpalatable to most Albertans.”
Taylor then asked for a show of hands from whoever would be willing to pay a five per cent provincial sales tax. Roughly half the hands went up.
“You gotta get your revenue from someplace,” said one voice.
When asked who was dead set against paying more tax, again roughly half the crowd raised their hands.
The tax issue came up again later when well-known seniors’ advocate Carol Wodak informed the crowd that Alberta takes in between $9 billion and $18 billion less than other provinces in personal and corporate income taxes.
“Think of the schools and the health care and everything else we could have for that missing revenue,” she said. “I know that taxes are unpopular but we’re not paying our share.
“For God’s sake, taxes aren’t a burden, they’re a privilege.”
Taylor responded by saying that most people who complain about taxes being too high really mean that they don’t see what they’re getting for their money. The government needs to show more accountability and transparency, he said, adding that there’s a risk to the low-tax mantra that dominates Alberta.
“If the taxes aren’t paid in this province like they are in other provinces, you run the risk that you’re going to have incredible private sector wealth around you and the public sector infrastructure of a have-not province,” Taylor said.
Swann told the crowd that the government first has to ensure it’s getting value for the money it’s currently spending, noting the province spends 23 per cent more per capita than its Canadian counterparts.
In a later interview he said the next step is to make revenue streams more sustainable and less susceptible to the boom and bust cycles of the oil and gas markets. He was cautious around the question of restructuring the tax system.
“The tax system has to be competitive or we lose people and industry to other provinces,” Swann said, “but we need a stable source of revenue and we need to be examining the tax system.”
His caucus hasn’t discussed the issue in depth and doesn’t have a firm position, he said.
“We would consult with Albertans about whether they support the flat tax or whether they would support a more progressive tax system,” Swann said.
Other provinces are moving to decrease their taxes to compete with Alberta, said Scott Hennig of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, so an increase in this province would eliminate the “Alberta advantage.”
Even so, he expects to see a tax hike from the Conservative government given its spring budget included $2 billion worth of “corrective actions” by the next fiscal year if its projected outlook fell short.
“I think they’re going to be looking at people’s wallets for that money,” Hennig said.
