Ever since the election in May, the B.C. Liberals have been dropping in the polls as fast as the water going over Niagara Falls.

On Friday, the Mustel Group released its latest political poll and it shows the Gordon Campbell Liberals trailing Carole James and the NDP by eight percentage points.

The survey of 500 British Columbians was conducted from Nov. 9-19 and found the NDP had the support of 43%, down 3% since May 12 — election day. The Liberals were supported by 35% of those polled and that’s a drop of 7% since the election.

What should be most worrisome for the Liberals is Campbell’s disapproval rating, which was a whopping 57%. James’s disapproval rating was 37%.

Surely the revelation after the election that the Liberals had misinformed the public — either deliberately or not — about the size of the provincial deficit and the plan to introduce the 12% harmonized sales tax has helped precipitate the plunge in popular support for the government.

Though he must have known it was sheer fantasy, on April 23 Campbell told skeptical reporters the following: “I can tell you this, the deficit for 2009-10 will be $495 million maximum.”

On July 8, less than two months after being returned to power, Finance Minister Colin Hansen admitted what economists, the opposition and he and the premier must have known for months that the often-quoted forecast of a $495-million deficit was pure fiction.

That is, in my opinion, the reason the Liberals reversed their stand on the HST.

The province faces a deficit in the $2-billion range and health authorities and school districts across the province insist they need more money.

By harmonizing the sales taxes, the province receives $1.6 billion in transitional funding from Ottawa.

The province needs the money. As does Ontario, which also agreed to implement the higher, er sorry, harmonized sales tax on July 1.

People don’t trust this B.C. government and that was demonstrated by the rough ride the public gave the legislature committee on finance during budget consultations surrounding the HST.

The report on those consultations, released appropriately enough on Friday 13th, shows there is some HST support from exporters, business leaders, resource industries and chambers of commerce.

But even the Liberal majority on the committee could not spin the fact that most of the feedback — some 3,500 submissions — were fuming about the Liberal’s after-election announcement.

“Many participants disagreed with the implementation of the HST,” reported the committee. People “disputed the claim that government, in fact, was reducing taxes — citing the HST as an example of a tax increase on individual consumers.”

To make the tax more palatable and to appease one of the more

vociferous critics of the tax and major contributor to the governing party, last week the Liberals announced an HST break for new-home buyers.

They increased the HST rebate threshold on new homes to $525,000 following an intensive behind-the-scenes lobbying effort by the real-estate industry and new home builders.

That’s fine if you live in Greater Vancouver or select cities in B.C.

Ontario went another route. They decided to not apply the tax on restaurant meals under $4 — the so-called Tim Hortons exemption.

Once again, the Campbell government gives a break to those who have enough money to be able to afford a half-million dollar home but not for those who can scrape the money together for a coffee and doughnut.

Walter Cordery’s column appears regularly in this spot. He can be reached at 250-729-4237 or via e-mail at: WCordery@nanaimodailynews.com