B.C.’s wineries, breweries and spirit producers are speaking out about Canada’s GST holiday.
They say they are not getting the GST break when dealing with B.C.’s provincial government.
“I think one of the biggest takeaways of it is that the governments themselves are struggling to implement the GST holiday properly and the scale of complexity that it would take to change over the government’s internal systems to be able to properly apply the tax reduction is what ultimately they pointed to as the holdup for why they couldn’t implement it properly,” Emily Boston, a senior policy analyst with the Canadian Federation of Independent Business told Global News.
She added that if the government is struggling to implement its own policies, how are small businesses able or expected to comply?
“This is an issue that we’re aware of, and it definitely lays plain just how challenging this is for smaller retailers,” Boston said.
A two-month break on some items from the federal GST took effect on Dec. 14.
The federal government announced the plan to temporarily waive the five-per cent goods and services tax in a bid to help ease affordability concerns during the holiday season.
However, the BC Liquor Distribution Branch has told manufacturers they may need to continue remitting the tax on their end, saying the board system is too complicated to change for such a short time.
Small-scale producers say this is just another hit that their businesses do not need.
“There seems to be this ambiguity in … whether or not we’re going to be having to eat an extra five-per cent off our bottom line this season,” Teresa Townsley with Festina Lente Estate Winery said.
The Liquor Distribution Branch said it will work with producers on a case-by-case basis to minimize the impact of the tax holiday.
“A huge portion of small business owners told us that they weren’t sure that this GST holiday was going to have any impacts on whether or not their revenues went up or down,” Boston said.
“And that has been a story that we’ve heard as the holiday has went on, is that they’re not sure how many customers are there because they’re going to save a couple of bucks on a holiday. But that said, a more permanent version of this holiday is something that would be way more desirable for small businesses as they’d be better able to prepare.”
She added that many small businesses have said they will expect a drop-off after the Christmas season when consumers will be less likely to frequent their stores anyway.
