The writer鈥檚 name is so far a secret, but the words are echoing in the legislature. An unnamed bureaucrat resigned from the public service last month, leaving behind a scorching critique of the province鈥檚 policy on royalties, the money it collects from natural-gas producers.
Just as the formerly environmentalist NDP government is bending over backward to build a liquefied-natural-gas industry in B.C., the letter says the province is already giving away the farm. The writer says B.C. has forgone almost $6 billion in revenue over the past 16聽years.
Companies can get a 鈥渄eep-well credit,鈥� which reduces the royalties they have to pay on deep wells that were once considered more difficult. But today, such wells are the norm, so 99 per cent qualify for the credit.
鈥淧ut simply, the Crown is giving out $2 in available rebates for every $1 in royalty/tax payable,鈥� the writer says.
The resources the companies are drilling for belong to the Crown, which means the taxpayers. Royalties are assessed to make sure the owners share in the revenue.
The credit might have made sense in the days before horizontal drilling, but now we are giving companies incentives to do what they would do anyway.
The result, as the writer says, is 鈥渁n ongoing, eye-watering transfer of the provincial tax burden from natural-gas producers to the B.C. taxpayer.鈥�
The government has to review its policies and make sure British Columbians are getting a fair return from the resources they own.
