The Fight HST campaign is launching what it’s calling MLA Survivor Recall, a competition among 18 ridings to see which MLAs will be targeted first.
The group released a list of 18 MLAs, including finance minister Colin Hansen, but not including B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell.
Former B.C. premier Bill Vander Zalm said the only way the group would stop the recall process would be if the HST referendum is held this year, and is based on a question that the Fight HST group agrees to.
Fight HST organizer Chris Delaney said Cariboo Chilcotin, Oak Bay Gordon Head, Kamloops North Thompson and Boundary Similkameen are the front running ridings, with many canvassers already registered.
The MLA Survivor Recall competition will determine the first three MLAs to be targeted, but the recall campaigns won’t end there, Delaney said.
A new recall will launch every month after the first three, and will continue until the HST is eliminated or there is a new government, Delaney said.
The recall initiative requires forty per cent of registered voters in a riding to sign up, and takes about four months to complete.
Premier Gordon Campbell said last week he will scrap the controversial harmonized sales tax if that’s how a majority of British Columbians vote in a provincewide referendum set for Sept. 24, 2011.
The startling announcement came after a few rocky weeks for Campbell during which numerous people, inside and outside the B.C. Liberal Party, called on him to resign over his handling of the HST issue.
Campbell’s announcement came less than an hour after a legislative committee considering an anti-HST petition voted to hold the 2011 referendum rather than refer the issue to the legislature for a debate that could have begun as early as next month.
tsherlock@vancouversun.com
The 18 MLAs whose ridings have an "MLA Survivor Recall" recruitment drive are:
Comments