B.C. Conservatives promise to raise basic personal exemption to $32,000

B.C. Conservative Leader Lorne Doerkson promised at a Surrey grocery store on Thursday to raise the provincial basic personal exemption from $13,216 to $32,000, which he said would lower taxes for British Columbians by up to $1,000 a year, the Vancouver Sun reported.

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"British Columbians will be able to earn more than anyone else in Canada before paying a cent of provincial tax," Doerkson said, adding that people earning minimum wage would pay no provincial income tax.

Doerkson did not say how much the change would cost. David Duff, director of the tax program at UBC's Peter A. Allard School of Law, estimated it at $3 billion to $4 billion a year. "So that's like a 20 to 25 per cent increase in the deficit just by that one measure," he said.

Doerkson said he would not cut health care or education and would instead grow the economy through measures such as tripling LNG production by 2035.