1,000,000 jobs and counting, working with small business

Small business has always been the backbone of our economy. Small businesses employ over a million people in BC and account for over one-third of our entire provincial economic activity. Confidence is key to the expansion and success of small businesses, and the new confidence created since our election in 2001 has generated 39,500 new small businesses and an additional 159,000 jobs in our communities.

But now, with the global economy hammering small businesses’ access to credit, cash flow and customer growth, the last thing small businesses need is a $450 million cost imposed by the NDP to increase the minimum wage. The last thing they can afford is an increase in their payroll costs of close to 30 per cent, with benefits, as the Opposition’s minimum wage policy would impose. We know that would only lead to more layoffs, more job losses and cash-strapped businesses that would be pushed into bankruptcy. That is why we acted instead to cut the small business income tax rate by 44 per cent, and doubled commissions for retailers who collect PST on the province’s behalf. We want to remain a high-employment, high-wage province.

Our Platform is all about increasing consumer confidence and lowering costs on small business, to help them become more competitive and to stimulate new business investment. If you’re laying your life savings on the line to create or expand a small business, you need to know that the government will increase certainty and not add to your risks and costs with reckless changes in labour policy, employment standards, WorkSafe regulations, or other NDP experiments in “social engineering.”

A BC Liberal Government will continue to lower costs for small business. It will:

Reduce the small business income tax to the lowest rate in Canada by April 1, 2012
Raise the small business income tax threshold to $500,000 on January 1, 2010, to make more small businesses eligible for that significant tax advantage
Double the maximum available BC Training Tax Credit by July 1, 2009
Continue to reduce regulations and red tape
Create a new voluntary, defined contribution pension plan for self-employed workers, small business owners and their employees
Implement the Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement with Alberta
Develop the new Western Economic Partnership with Alberta and Saskatchewan, to open up new opportunities for business expansions through harmonized procurement, regulatory and business registration processes
Launch a review of the BC Assessment process, to identify improvements that might be made for fairer assessments to lower the unfair burden of property taxes on small businesses