Marlene Jennings supports GST campaign for the health sector

The campaign – started in partnership with local community leader Murray Levine – aims to allow Canada’s health sector receive a 100% GST rebate. The groundswell movement has found its momentum growing with the help of a petition making the rounds in hospitals and households across Canada.

The petition asks that the Government of Canada allow Canada’s health sector to be granted a full GST rebate, a privilege already granted to Canadian municipalities. The money would then be allocated as hospitals see fit to meet their respective priorities. These priorities include the purchase of medical equipment and supplies.

The petition also requests that Canadian hospitals, long-term care facilities and home and community care facilities be exempted from remitting the GST collected in and on hospital property, and that these funds be remitted instead to the hospital foundation where collected, and used for the purchase of medical equipment.

Marlene Jennings says the idea is good public policy at a time when the health care system is beginning to experience the stress brought about by the ageing baby boomer demographic. “This is something Canadian health care associations have been asking for a long time,” she says. “If this initiative is adopted, we could see a new MRI machine in Montreal within a very short period of time”.

Ms. Jennings hopes the petition’s message will resonate with the government, and is inclined to believe it will. “This is a non-partisan issue that is good for all Canadians, and I believe the government will see it as such”. She added that provincial governments should also get on board with the campaign, given their role of primary contributories to Canadian health care.

Anyone who wishes to show their support for the GST exemption initiative is urged to sign the petition by writing to GSTPetition@gmail.com.