While David Eby takes on wealthy investors by expanding the speculation and vacancy tax, BCU Party MLA Renee Merrifield is doubling down on the party’s opposition to the tax.

“This is a ridiculous tax that does absolutely nothing to increase the supply of housing,” Merrifield wrote on twitter immediately after the announcement.

In fact, the speculation and vacancy tax has put 20,000 more homes on the market in Metro Vancouver alone. Kevin Falcon’s plan to cancel it would rip thousands of units off the market and back into the hands of speculators.

Here are 14 other times Kevin Falcon has come out against the speculation and vacancy tax: 

“Why on earth is government hammering non-speculating taxpaying Canadians, who are often an important part of our tourism and seasonal economies?” (Daily Hive, March 26 2018)

“This NDP provision does little to reduce the impact this tax will have on British Columbians who own recreational, seasonal, and secondary properties.” (Daily Hive, March 26 2018)

“So when you’re someone from Toronto, a professor in Toronto, that buys a condominium in Vancouver, visits it in the summer and is looking to retire here and is very excited about that prospect, now we’re saying oh, OK, well, since you’re doing that we’re now going to punish you for making that investment.” (CBC Early Edition, May 8 2018)

“Mis-named speculation taxes that primarily target B.C. residents while ignoring speculators only add to the problem.” (Vancouver Sun, July 2 2020)

“All they did [with the speculation tax] was add more costs to housing and instead of prices going down, actually prices have continued to go up.” (Vancouver Sun, May 17 2021)

“I’ve been pointing out that the blizzard of taxes that they’ve introduced since 2017 have done nothing but restrict supply and add costs for home buyers: They’ve introduced a speculation tax that has nothing to do with speculation.” (Falcon Leadership fundraising email, July 29 2021)

“They layered on all this new blizzard of taxes onto housing, the speculation tax, the vacancy tax, the increased foreign buyers tax and on and on it went…. If you add more cost to housing, you just increased the cost of housing. And this is the fundamental departure for us and them.” (BC Liberal Debate, Dec 14 2021)

“If you’re going to introduce a whole blizzard of new taxes on housing, as the NDP did in 2018, and believe that that is going to bring about housing affordability, you are seriously misunderstanding and misreading fundamental economics….The speculation, tax, the vacancy tax, all the new taxes on vacant land; all of these are costs that get passed along ultimately to the buyer.” (CBC Early Edition, Feb 7 2022)

“So the speculation tax actually refers to people that own second properties. So, lots of British Columbians will own a cabin at the lake or maybe a second investment condo or something like that. And two thirds of that so-called speculation tax are being paid by British Columbians.” (Connect FM, Feb 24 2022)

“What this speculation tax is, is a tax on people that own second homes, and that might even be a cottage or a cabin that you’ve got on a lake somewhere. It’s mostly paid for by British Columbians. It’s people that own their second property.” (Punjabi Press Club, March 15 2022)

“These are people that have a second property and they’re being forced to pay, you know, an additional cost. So once again, the NDP, they’ve named it something that sounds good, a speculation tax, but it is not dealing with speculation. So I think the first thing we have to do is look at all of the taxes that are imposed on housing.” (Darpan, April 11 2022)

“I think the challenge with [the speculation and vacancy tax] is that most of it is being paid by British Columbians.” (The Tyee, July 1 2022)

“It has nothing to do with speculation… I don’t want people to be confused and think it has to deal with speculators because it deals with very few speculators.” (CBC All Points West, February 28 2023)