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Squamish District Councillor Lauren Greenlaw is calling on the province to overturn a planned expansion of the Provincial Sales Tax, arguing the change will drive up costs for small businesses, tradespeople, and ordinary residents at a time when many are already struggling.
The expansion, which received Royal Assent in April 2026, is scheduled to come into force on October 1. It extends the PST to a range of professional services that were previously exempt, including accounting, bookkeeping, auditing, architecture, engineering, geoscience, private security, and non-residential property and strata management. Textiles and some telecommunications services also fall under the legislation.
Greenlaw, who forwarded the proposed resolution to Squamish council in a May 28 email, has submitted it to the Union of BC Municipalities as an emergency resolution, given the legislation passed after the standard deadline for local government submissions. The resolution asks UBCM to formally request the provincial government reverse course.
Greenlaw argues the tax change contradicts the province’s own stated priorities. She says that adding PST to engineering and geoscience services “is in direct opposition to the province’s own goals of expediting critical mineral extraction.” Similarly, she argues that applying the tax to architectural and engineering services used in residential construction “works directly against initiatives of the province to get housing built, and have some be affordable.”
She also has concerns about the PST expansion’s impacts on small businesses. “Small businesses operate, generally, on very slim margins,” she said, pointing to Squamish’s own downtown as evidence of the pressure already being felt. “In the last six months in downtown alone we have lost Teag and Grey, Grateful Gift Shop, Queen Bee Boudoir and Eclectic Circle.”
Unlike GST, PST cannot be reclaimed by businesses, which Greenlaw says will mean added costs passed onto consumers.
Greenlaw also raises concerns about the expansion’s effect on the textile and fibre arts community, arguing it discourages slow fashion, harms farmers and small retailers, and disproportionately affects women-centred spaces.
“Quilting, knitting, fibre arts related businesses are community spaces where women gather and make,” she said. “These spaces are vitally important to the well being of this community.”
The revenue generated by the full expansion is estimated at approximately $220 million per year, said Greenlaw. She argues this is a small return relative to the province’s roughly $9 billion deficit. “It is an absolute drop in the bucket of the provincial budget, relative to the damage it will cause,” she said, arguing the province should instead pursue revenue through corporate taxes, windfall taxes on fossil fuel profits, and wealth taxes.
Greenlaw sites many industry groups on record against it, including the BC Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses, the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade, the Mining Association of BC, and the Urban Development Institute. The City of Abbotsford has also voiced opposition, and thousands of signatures have been gathered across multiple online petitions.
A legal petition requiring physical signatures is also underway. Unlike an online petition, a legal petition to the legislature must be gathered in person. Anyone wishing to help collect signatures can contact Greenlaw directly at lgreenlaw@squamish.ca.
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