It looks to me like your talking about Ontario.
Indeed on July 1 the PST and the GST were for the purpose of collection combined into the HST.
Unfortunately I am well aware of it, being that I live there.
What makes it particularly onerous and odious to me
is that Ontario didn’t not remove the existing provincial ST on gasoline
resulting in a case of double taxation of gas on the provincial level.
Since 50% of my business expense is gasoline
I’m not too happy with the resultant ~8% increase in fuel cost.
The Liberals in charge touted the HST as away to make provincial businesses more competitive.
I see it as a 4% decrease in my net income.
Yes I was primarily talking about Ontario and in addition to gasoline the new HST hits new home sales as well. My understanding is that although the total of 13% is less than the old GST + PST, the HST now hits ALL goods and services so consumers end up paying more overall.
Gasoline is something everyone uses and I noticed that gas prices went up 10 cents a litre to about $1 a liter right after Jul 1.