With little regard to facts, some B.C. and Ontario Conservative MPs have started claiming that the federal government had " nothing to do" with those two provinces' decisions to harmonize the GST and provincial sales taxes:
"Conservative MPs are playing down Ottawa's role in convincing Ontario and B.C. to move towards tax harmonization, saying the federal government had nothing to do with the decision even though it's kicking in billions of dollars to ease the transition."
In fact, B.C. MP Dick Harris went as far as to blame Jean Chrétien for leaving the federal government no choice but to support harmonization (it made no more sense when he said it then I write it).
There is at least one Conservative MP who must disagree with this interpretation of events. From the 2008 budget that an Ontario MP named Jim Flaherty presented:
"Provincial sales tax harmonization is the single most important step provinces with RSTs could take to improve the competitiveness of Canadian businesses....The Government recognizes the significant economic benefits to Canada from sales tax harmonization and is willing to work with the five provinces that still have RSTs to help facilitate the transition to provincial value-added sales taxes harmonized with the GST."
I could go through about 100 speeches and press releases where Flaherty called on the provinces to harmonize the two taxes but I'm not sure what the point in doing so would be.
What's odd is harmonization is actually one of the few achievements that Harper and Flaherty might be able to point to as a positive record for the economy in their second term. It's also one of the few examples of where they have worked co-operatively with the provinces (with the exception of Quebec). As it turns out, certain caucus members would rather say they had nothing to do with it.