Senior care providers in BC say the Harmonized Sales Tax will add another 10 million dollars a year to their tax burden and they will be pinched if the Province doesn't offset the extra cost.
BC Care Providers Association CEO Ed Helfrich says facilities with more contracted services will take the biggest hit, "The impacts are obviously quite significant. We have an individual facility that has a potential cost increase of $200,000. That would equate to four or five positions that would have to be eliminated in order to maintain the budget."
But Helfrich says he's optimistic the Province will step up with some form of mitigation. He points to Premier Campbell's pledge to reinvest the 1.6 billion dollars in Federal Transition Funding into health and education when the HST comes into effect.
