» Editor’s Note
The HST Comes to Ontario
J
uly 1, 2010 will mark the launch of the harmonized sales tax (HST) in Ontario, combining its current 5% GST and 8% PST into a single 13% blended
sales tax. For consumers, this means an additional 8% tax on
products and services such as gasoline, home electricity, phone charg- es, lawyer fees, magazine subscriptions, massage, chiropractic, and of course, fitness club dues and personal training fees. All of this was an- nounced in the middle of a recessionary economy and on the heels of the largest single tax increase in the province’s history, the Ontario health tax. One Ontario club operator has taken steps to challenge the HST as
it applies to health and fitness services (see “Fighting the HST” on page 11). The Fitness Industry Council of Canada, already actively engaged in the fight against impending music tariff legislation, is also mobiliz- ing resources to make the case against the blended tax. In future issues of Fitness Business Canada, we’ll talk to club opera-
tors in the Atlantic provinces to hear how their businesses were affect- ed after the HST was implemented there in 1997. Stay tuned.
Graham Longwell
graham@fitnet.ca
CANADA
Vol. 10 No. 3 – May/June 2009
BOARD OF ADVISORS Colin Milner
Chief Executive Officer, International Council on Active Aging, Vancouver, B.C.
Dale Argento
President, The West Island Club, Montreal, Que.
David Hardy
President, Club Fit Corp, Edmonton, Alta.
David Patchell-Evans
CEO & Founder, GoodLife Fitness Clubs, president, Can-Fit-Pro, London, Ont.
Dr. Greg Anderson
Kinesiology & Physical Educ., University College of the Fraser Valley, Mission, B.C.
Joe Doiron
Senior Policy Analyst, Physical Activity Unit, Health Canada, Ottawa, Ont.
John Frittenburg
President, The JF Group, B.C.
Karin Lofstrom
Executive Director, Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women in Sport and Physical Activity
Larry Greene
General Director, La Sporthèque de Hull, Hull, Que.
Michael Levy
Executive Director, Spa Chakra Fitness, Chairman of the IHRSA Board of Directors
Susan Mundick
General Manager Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation, Vancouver, B.C.
AUTHORS IN THIS ISSUE
Rick Caro, Rachel Debling, John Frittenburg, Barb Gormley, Nanci Guest, Kathryn Korchok, Karen Lemoine, Don Longwell, Rod Macdonald, Sheldon Persad, Michael Scott Scudder, Peter Twist, Amanda Vogel, Dave Wright
Publisher
Graham Longwell President, Mill Pond Publishing Inc.
Editor
Graham Longwell
graham@fitnet.ca
Managing Editor
Barb Gormley
Contributing Editors
Rachel Debling
Photography
Cathy Chatterton
Graphic Designer
Jonathan Cresswell-Jones
General Manager
Mill Pond Publishing Inc. Stephen Longwell
stephen@fitnet.ca
Vice-President, Sales
Lori Longwell
lori@fitnet.ca
Correspondence, return address, change of address, advertising or subscription:
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6 Fitness Business Canada May/June 2009
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