Adam Stirling's Comment

There have been several great editorials, polls, and news story's regarding the HST in recent days.  One is from Adam Stirling (CFAX 1070 radio), around some of the confusion people have with the question, and it follows below.

The Globe and Mail has a news story this morning as well on 'current' voter intentions (B.C. HST ‘fix’ not enough to save tax in referendum)-- and there is a letter of support from the BC Tourism Industry which has just been published in BCLocalNews.com.  

Meantime, here is the editorial comment from Adam Stirling: 

Which side will come out on top as British Columbians vote whether to keep the HST, or rather I should say whether to kill it?  The distinction between those two questions is important because the yes vs. no question still continues to be a significant problem in term of confusion according to a new survey.






Results of a new poll released by Angus Reid over the weekend show 44% of voters plan to kill the controversial tax and 38% will plan to keep the tax, but will voters accidentally support the wrong side?
Notice that neither of the numbers in the poll taken between June 8th and 10th represent the majority of British Columbians. That's because 18% of voters surveyed indicate they have not yet decided on the issue, or don't plan to vote.


There was one piece of information I found very interesting in this release. There was a question that actually had the support of the majority of British Columbians. This question had nothing to do with the tax, however. Instead this question had to do with the question on the referendum.


A majority of British Columbians, 55%, say they find the referendum question confusing. The question asks whether one wants to get rid of the HST and return to the old GST/PST system. This means one votes yes to kill the HST and no to keep it.


What is even more troubling about the confusing nature of the question, is the fact that some people think they understand it but they don't... The survey found 55% of people new the right answer to the yes vs. no question, and 23% admitted they weren't sure.


The upshot here is that 22% of respondents thought they knew the answer, but they were wrong. These people, if they had voted today, could have voted to kill the tax if they wanted to keep it, and vice versa.
With the vote so close, news that more than 1/5th of people might accidentally vote for the opposite of what they intend is more than troubling...


This is Adam Stirling.

Just a quick note to close ... in my own poll ,conducted on this blog over the past couple week, 75% of respondents indicated they would be voting to end the HST