June 7, Vancouver B.C. – In B.C., the NDP has made a statement that people who suffer from chronic diseases and need massage therapy are the latest to be hit by the harmonized sales tax.

Health critic Adrian Dix says massage therapists who treat people with diseases such as multiple sclerosis will have to charge their patients the HST, pushing treatment costs toward $100 an hour.

He says the government is imposing the tax despite warnings from patients and health care professionals that it hurt those needing the treatment for chronic illness.

However, Finance Minister Colin Hansen says a health profession can't be exempted from federal tax unless it's regulated in at least five provinces, and massage therapists are only regulated in three  -
Ontario, Newfoundland and British Columbia.

He says the government is providing a HST credit for low and modest income people as well as increasing the basic personal amount tax credit.

Meanwhile, organizers of an anti-HST petition say they've now signed up 15 per cent of registered voters in all but five of B.C.'s 85 ridings, five per cent more than the minimum needed for the petition to succeed in getting either a vote in the legislature or a referendum.