Policy & Positions Manual

Policy Priority Area - Reform of Local Government

The Need for a Business Vote in BC (2011)

Under the Community Charter in BC, municipalities are being given significantly more authority today than in the past, with no commensurate level of accountability.  Indeed, BC is unique in terms of the degree of power and autonomy provided to local governments.  When this is combined with the fact that in BC business owners and operators do not have any voting rights in municipal elections we have seen the development of significant inequities develop between business and residential property tax rates.

Business owners have become the silent taxpayers. They are the easiest group on which to increase taxes because they no longer have a vote(1). Many business owners live outside their jurisdiction and cannot be part of the election process or vote in a referendum which may impact their business directly. This gives them no voice in the community in which they pay the highest taxes. It’s taxation without representation.

Local Election Task Force
The issue of the corporate vote was recently reviewed by the Local Election Task Force created in December 2009.  The Task Force was created as a joint, consensus-based group of three provincial government and three Union of BC Municipality members.

The task force was mandated to review issues related to local government elections, including the introduction of a corporate vote.  The committee received numerous submissions, including from the Chamber, calling for the introduction of a business vote.  The Chamber was therefore disappointed that in the final report the task force recommended “maintaining the existing voter eligibility rules on this issue and not establishing a corporate vote.(2)”

The rationale given in the report for this position was that “balancing the interests of businesses, local governments and the public is an essential consideration when contemplating a corporate or business vote”.   It went on to state that “there was no approach evident to the Task Force that would ensure fairness among businesses, equity for electors and administrative workability.”

A Fair, workable model
During the consultation phase the Chamber partnered with the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and the Business Council of BC, in close consultation with key Ministry staff, to design a system for a business vote.  This model included a set of principles that would define the business vote.  These were;

  • the business must have a business number issued by Canada Revenue Agency

  • the business must have a non-residential real property address

  • the business must be paying a business class property tax

  • the business must appoint a designated proxy to vote on its behalf

  • a registered business voter may only be registered to vote for one business in a given municipality


The Chamber believes this model constitutes fairness among businesses.

In short, a legitimate business physically located within a municipality paying business property tax would be eligible for a vote.

This system would require coordination between existing Canada Revenue Agency and BC Assessment Authority databases.  This list, which would be maintained by the province, would then simply require a designated voter for the business.

The issue of equity, often described as one person one vote, is problematic as a business vote will likely mean that one individual could be awarded the opportunity to vote more than once in a municipal election. 

Whenever we discuss the issue of principles and voting one principle that the chamber believes it critical to this discussion is the principle of ‘no taxation without representation.’  This principle has been utilized within the BC local election act to allow for non-resident property owners to be allocated a vote in the municipality where they own property.  This is an important point; there is already a clear exception to the principle of one person one vote.  While we recognize that an individual does not currently have the right to vote more than once in a single municipality an individual can vote more than once in the same municipal election.

Local Government Support
The Local Election Task Force report stated that “UBCM’s policy position is not to support the corporate vote”.  The Chamber has expressed significant concern that in a joint, consensus based model as was used for the task force the position of UBCM was bound to lead to an outcome where the business vote would not be accepted within a consensus report.

Further to this the Chamber has been consistent in expressing concern that the position of UBCM does not reflect the fact that there is considerable support within many municipalities for the re-introduction of the business vote.  Indeed, CFIB issued a press release in May 2010 entitled ``CFIB commends mayors and councilors for supporting the return of the business vote (3)`` which listed four Mayors and four councilors as being supportive of the need to introduce a business vote.

We believe it is worth noting several further points.  Firstly this is an issue that continues to be raised with resolutions being presented in 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2006 & 2008 and 2010 (full text of these resolutions can be found in the UBCM history document). This demonstrates a significant degree of recognition of the unfairness of this issue from local and regional governments across the province on an ongoing basis.

While these resolutions have always failed to pass on the floor of UBCM this does not necessarily reflect deep opposition by delegates but is at least partly a reflection of the fact that the Resolutions Committee has opposed these resolutions.  This opposition is based on a 1998 policy paper drafted to address a number of issues around the 1993 reform of the legislation governing local government elections. 

This paper, under section B3, stated that “like the results of votes on Convention on the same topic, there was a close draw between respondents for and against this issue.”  In subsequent years the Resolutions Committee have stated in opposition to resolutions on this issue that “the current UBCM policy dates back to the 1998 UBCM Convention when delegates considered a policy paper on elections issues. On this issue the delegates selected the option of no change to present legislation (no corporate vote).

Further to this concern the Chamber also believes that the reality regarding the need for business to be representing in municipal elections has changed dramatically since 1998.  Local governments continue to tell us that they are being expected to provide an ever increasing range of services through downloading from senior levels of government. The expansion of services provided by local government has a direct impact on the business community as the role of local governments in providing the foundation for economic growth is a key determinant of businesses ability to attract workers, service customers, and expand their businesses. While these services are also of significant importance to the resident of a community the significant difference is that residents of a community have the ability to hold their elected representatives to account through the exercise of their democratic rights every three years – business has no such right.

The fact that businesses do not have the vote has led to some municipalities levying an unfair burden of property tax onto their business community.  The Chamber is concerned that not only do studies suggest that business uses fewer services than residential and yet, they are paying so much more but as municipalities face increased infrastructure costs the current system will lead to municipalities continuing to hide the true costs from voting residential taxpayers by furthering the inequity by saddling business with ever greater levels of property tax irrespective of their ability to pay.


THE CHAMBER RECOMMENDS

That the Provincial Government allow business a greater say in municipal elections through the introduction of a business vote that allocates one vote to every business with a business number paying business class municipal property tax to be exercised by a designated individual

1 A corporate vote existed in BC until 1993.