Provincial sales taxes will be removed from more grocery store items under Manitoba’s next budget, and one researcher says the province may be the first to do so.

Currently, Manitobans pay provincial sales tax (PST) on prepared food and drinks sold for immediate consumption.

That includes “rotisserie chickens, salads, a case of Bubly — all the stuff that you’re grabbing on the way home when you’re in a rush and you gotta try and put a meal on the table for the family,” Premier Wab Kinew announced in a post on social media Tuesday.

“After our budget passes — assuming it passes by July 1 — that will all be tax free,” Kinew said.

It’s a “bold move” that will relieve some pressure on Manitobans at the grocery store, says Sylvain Charlebois, director of Dalhousie University’s Agri-Food Analytics Lab in Nova Scotia.

Manitoba may be the first Canadian province to eliminate the tax at the grocery store, he said.

“I think it should be welcome news for the rest of Canada, as far as I’m concerned, [and] I think perhaps other provinces should follow suit,” Charlebois told CBC News.

    • assaultpotato@sh.itjust.works
      5·
      3 days ago

      Yes, I hope the NDP are able to kill the existing ones. Generally I like Wab and the NDP, he was my MLA for a great number of years. I just wish our politics broadly wasn’t so focused on cutting taxes. The gas tax “vacation” hurt my soul, we need to be doubling down on transit and active transportation, not encouraging every family go buy a 2nd F150 to take the kids to work.

      I’ll firmly vote NDP again, I’ll never let perfect be the enemy of good.

    • BCsven
      2·
      3 days ago

      Meanwhile Loblaws owns a property company that leases out land only to bloblaws