44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 9, 2021 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I will share my time with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
It is always an honour to rise in the House and to speak, especially on the important motion we have before us today, which is our opposition day motion. Before I get started, I would like to give some credit. I am a shameless team promoter. I love this team. I will say it time and again. I want to give credit to the member for Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon for all of the incredible work he did on this file in the last Parliament. In fact, his work was used as the basis for a lot of our platform development. It received accolades from many groups across the country for the great ideas within our platform regarding housing. I wish him the best in the Asia-Pacific development file as he continues on. I also wish the best for the residents of B.C. as they come out of the difficult time they have been going through.
I would also like to recognize the wonderful member of Parliament for Edmonton Riverbend, who gave me the honour of speaking here today. I do not know if members know this, but he is the father of three children, including the beautiful baby Hugh. He knows this issue very well, because he is a family man. I have family who lives in his riding. I have mentioned that to him before. This affects him and his family and everyone in his community, so I am really happy to see him taking the charge on this motion and on the discussion here today.
I held this file under families, children and social development when I served as the shadow minister in that role. With that, I would like to recognize the new member for Fort McMurray—Cold Lake. What a fireball she is. I love that lady. She is a new mother and a strong voice for her constituents and for Albertans. When she got this role, I told her that this file was hard. I will tell members what I saw when I held that role of families, children and social development and housing was still under that file.
I saw government members traipse across the country, announce new housing initiatives, pat themselves on the backs and call it a day. They would make outrageous claims. In fact, the Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion continues to make claims. For example on November 29 of this year, he said, “Mr. Speaker, every Canadian deserves a safe and affordable place to call home. Since we came into office, we have helped over a million families get the housing they need”. He also said, on December 2, 2021, “We will keep working to make sure every Canadian has an affordable place to call home.”
That is not what I saw in my role at that time. I read the files. I looked around my community and I saw two things. I saw a government destroying my local economy with glee and forcing businesses and residents to vacate buildings, because all the business was gone and all the jobs had been lost. These buildings were being purchased by the government for a song and being turned into subsidized housing, and then the government declared a victory. This is what I saw time and again.
I will repeat that. The government would destroy the economy, force all the businesses to close, take all the good jobs away, purchase the buildings for a song, turn them into subsidized housing and say it had done a great job. It was terrible. There are no winners in that model.
While the government was passing Bill C-69, the no-more-pipelines bill, Bill C-48, the tanker moratorium bill, and the clean fuel standard, jumping, cheering and drinking out of their soggy paper straws, my constituents were suffering. They were wondering whether they could keep their houses or if they would have to move in with their sisters. They wondered how they were going to make rent that month, but the government did not care. Its members would show up on this floor week after week, claiming victory.
The second thing I saw was that all of these government programs the government was claiming victory over were the result of two things: a poor economy and higher taxation.
Every single benefit and every program that I considered, and wondered why Canadians would need, always came back to no jobs or no good jobs. While the government was destroying the economy, killing good jobs and taxing Canadians with one hand, it was handing out a measly little portion of what it had killed and collected with its other hand. What could Canadians do? Could they say no to the small amount that was offered to them? There were no jobs, and certainly no good jobs, to go back to.
I have the best riding in all of Canada. Calgary Midnapore was built on the backs of the generation that fuelled this nation for decades. Communities thrived in lakes and parks that were created by a love of what they did and what it meant for Canada. However, that all started to change six years ago. Jobs became scarce. Businesses went out of province and out of country, and people had to turn to these benefits. They had no choice, and they were grateful because their jobs were gone. I am starting to worry that some people are getting conditioned to believe that they do not deserve any better.
Now, we add affordability and inflation to this mix.
Canadian housing affordability deteriorated for a third consecutive quarter in Q3 of 2021. The mortgage payment on a representative home as a percentage of income rose 1.7 points after a 3.2-point increase in Q2 of 2021. Seasonally adjusted home prices increased 4.6% in Q3 of 2021 from Q2 of 2021, while median household income rose only 0.8%. Affordability deteriorated in all 10 markets covered in Q3. On a sliding scale of markets, from worst deterioration to least, were Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto, Ottawa-Gatineau, Hamilton, Montreal, Calgary, Quebec, Winnipeg and Edmonton. That was the third consecutive quarter with a worsening in all of those markets. Countrywide affordability deteriorated 0.7% in the condo portion, versus a 2.3% deterioration in the non-condo segment. Prices continued a relentless upward trajectory, rising 4.6% in the quarter and 18.6% year on year. That annual figure was the most it has been since 1989, which was before I graduated high school in Calgary Midnapore.
Let us talk about inflation. There is hardly a commodity that has not been touched. Natural gas is up 18.7%. Gasoline is up 41.7%, and I certainly think twice before I decide that it is time to fill my car. Ground beef is up 8.2%. Sausages are up 11.3%. Steak is up 13.6%. I examine the cuts way more thoroughly now before making my choices at the grocery market. Eggs, which are not even a direct meat product, are up 7.4%. Butter, another Canadian staple, is up 5.5%. Syrup is up 11.6%. Coffee is up 3.7%. Chicken is up 8.3%. A year ago I could buy the whole bird, and nothing but the whole bird, for $10. Now it is $14 when I go to the grocery store.
The current government wants to claim victory on this file, but I will not let it. The Liberals destroyed our economy, took away the good jobs and increased taxation, and they want to pat themselves on the back. I will not let them, and neither will Canadians.
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- Dec/9/21 12:22:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am still processing a lot of that.
The motion that the member's colleague and the Conservatives put forward today suggests that we consolidate all of the land that the federal government owns and then make 15% of it available for housing. If we look at the math and go to Statistics Canada, we can see exactly where the Conservatives get their number of 41 million hectares of available land. Of that, 97% is in Parks Canada, Environment Canada and National Defence.
To get to 15% and, assuming we got rid of all the other land that the federal government has, the remaining 3%, what 12% of Parks Canada, Environment Canada and National Defence would the member like to see disposed of for affordable housing?
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- Dec/9/21 12:23:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that question is totally irrelevant to everything that I talked about. It does not matter about the parkland, where we are going to get it or what parklands we are going to take. We love conservation. Conservatives were in fact the original conservators. We love nature.
I know what the government will continue to do. The Liberals will continue to destroy the economy so that they can get those buildings, and they can have more affordable housing for Canadians through taking away their jobs. That is not a solution.
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- Dec/9/21 12:24:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, today's motion aside, I always get the feeling the Conservatives love blaming the Liberals for any and every increase.
The big problem with housing is speculation and the fact that people use it to make money in the markets.
Does my colleague agree that it is time to shake up all federal government programs to get housing out of the hands of speculators and pass that responsibility on to community groups that know what people need so we can make sure the most vulnerable people get housing?
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- Dec/9/21 12:25:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, after listening to my colleague's question, I think we share the same idea. The most important thing to facilitate Canadians' access to housing is a strong economy. We need to ensure that lots of good jobs are available to Canadians. I think we agree on those ideas.
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- Dec/9/21 12:25:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in my riding of Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, the market has failed my residents, and it is still failing residents. We are regularly seeing houses overbid by $100,000.
I am wondering why the Conservatives did not take this opportunity to make mention of an indigenous housing strategy or of making a commitment to building non-market affordable housing. In my neck of the woods, and I think this is the same right across Canada, this is the type of housing that is in demand. People cannot afford to go out and buy houses. They need something that is non-market and affordable, and that is going to resolve their needs right now.
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- Dec/9/21 12:26:28 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I can hear that my colleague's constituents are facing the same problems I referenced in my speech, and that many Canadians are facing from coast to coast to coast. I am not sure if the member missed the beginning part of my speech when I gave credit to our member for Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon. He developed incredible platform contributions regarding this specific piece and indigenous housing in particular, which actually received accolades from indigenous communities across the country.
Again, I can see that, with my colleagues from the Bloc and the NDP, we have the shared objectives of better lives and housing for all Canadians.
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- Dec/9/21 12:27:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the government's failure to properly oversee and regulate Canada's banking system and its failure to properly manage fiscal policy are the two reasons Canadian families are struggling with skyrocketing housing prices and why Canadian families are burdened with record high levels of household indebtedness. The government is also putting the stability of our financial system at risk. It is mispricing risk, leading to the misallocation of capital toward residential real estate. As David Rosenberg has said, Canada's economy is overly reliant on “credit, cannabis and condos”.
The average house price in this country has skyrocketed over the six years the government has been in power. According to The Canadian Real Estate Association, the actual benchmark price for a home in this country has gone from $430,000 in November 2015, when the government was appointed to office, to $726,000 in October of this year, the last month for which we have data. This is a massive increase of 77% over the last six years. That is an annual compounded rate of increase of about 10% per annum, far ahead of the nominal growth of GDP. It is putting the cost of housing out of reach for many young families and individuals looking to get a start to their lives.
The average house price for a single detached home in Toronto is now $1.8 million. It is $2.9 million in Vancouver. In Fergus and Elora, two small towns in the rural area of my riding of Wellington—Halton Hills, the typical house price has trebled in the last five years. It has gone from approximately $325,000 in 2015 to $950,000 in 2020.
These prices are way, way above the long-term average of three and a half times household income. Prices in many Canadian communities are now eight, nine and 10 times household income. We are an outlier among advanced economies of the OECD. In fact, our housing prices are some of the most expensive in the world.
As housing prices have skyrocketed, so too has household debt. Mortgage debt makes up the vast majority of household debt. Mortgage debt comprises two-thirds of overall household debt, and the remaining one-third of household debt is closely tied to real estate in facilities such has HELOCs and other forms of credit.
In 2016, the first full year the government was in office, household debt stood at $1.9 trillion. Today, it is $2.6 trillion, an increase of almost 40% and an annual compounded rate of increase of almost 6%, far ahead of the nominal rate of increase of our GDP. That amount of household debt is reflected in the fact that household debt as a percentage of household income has also increased since the government took office. It now stands at 173%.
The government has allowed this to happen. We have a housing crisis in this country, and it is because of the government's failure to properly oversee and regulate the banking system and its failure to properly manage fiscal policy.
The government has had plenty of warning about this problem. Before I get into who has warned the government about it, let me tell members one of the unintended consequences of these skyrocketing housing prices and skyrocketing levels of household indebtedness.
Small to medium-sized enterprises have found it difficult to get financing. Canada has low levels of business investment relative to many of our economic peers. This low level of business investment is one reason for our low productivity growth rates. This low productivity growth rate is of particular concern because it is the only long-run determinate of wealth and prosperity.
These two challenges, namely the challenge of skyrocketing household debt and the difficulty many small and medium-sized businesses have in getting financing to make investments in plant capital and equipment, are two sides of the same coin. The government needs to take a hard look at the macroeconomic policies it has put in place, which have made life less affordable for Canadian families, and the policies that are making it difficult for businesses to invest, grow and create jobs.
The government is ultimately responsible for the regulation of our banking sector through the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions. It is also responsible for mortgage financing through the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, tax expenditures, government programs and Finance Canada. It has allowed mortgage credit to grow at unsustainable levels. Its responsibility is to oversee mortgage credit through OSFI and CMHC.
The IMF has warned Canada repeatedly over the last number of years about its oversight of housing finance. In addition, the IMF found, through its studies, that government intervention in housing finance exacerbated house price swings and amplified mortgage credit growth in advanced economies in the years before the global financial crisis. Moreover, the IMF's studies also concluded that government participation did not provide a cushion against economic crises, and countries with greater government involvement in mortgage financing experienced deeper house price declines.
In a 2011 analysis, the IMF concluded, “rapid mortgage credit growth and strong house price increases go hand in hand.” It added, “government participation in housing finance exacerbated house price swings and amplified mortgage credit growth during the run-up to the recent crisis, particularly in advanced economies.” It concluded by saying, “Countries with more government involvement also experienced deeper house price declines.”
The officials at Finance Canada and CMHC have warned the government. For example, last year in September, officials at Finance Canada discussed forcing private mortgage insurers to tighten eligibility rules, but left CMHC to try to manage the risk in mortgage credit markets on its own. Evan Siddall, the CMHC CEO at the time, said, “We had that conversation and you’ll have to pose the question to [the government] as to why it didn’t happen.” In reference to the rejection of the tightening of the rules to reduce risks, he added, “The minister of finance could have done it.”
OSFI itself has warned about skyrocketing levels of mortgage credit and mortgage credit growth, but when it proposed higher mortgage stress test levels in 2018, otherwise known as the B-20 guideline, the Minister of Finance opposed the rule. In March of last year, when OSFI announced changes to capital requirements for Canada's systemically important banks, the government did not ensure that additional liquidity, measured in the hundreds of billions of dollars, would not exacerbate the growth in mortgage credit. As a result, household debt, primarily mortgage credit, has jumped 4% in the last year, picking up sharply in the middle of last year, after the March 2020 changes that OSFI had introduced.
The Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem, warned earlier this year that Canadian households were taking on too much debt. In other words, the governor was warning the government that it is not using the tools it has at hand to properly regulate mortgage credit growth in this country.
Canadian families are finding it harder to make ends meet. They are being squeezed by the increasing cost of living and by the cost of housing. This is due to the government's failure to properly oversee and regulate Canada's banking sector and properly manage fiscal policy.
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- Dec/9/21 12:37:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my question is about the broader context of the motion that has been brought forward. Members of the Liberal caucus have been challenging the opposition to provide some detail as to where they believe they will get the minimum 15% from Canada's land bank given that, in essence, our military, Environment Canada and Parks Canada have close to 90% of it.
Where did the Conservatives get their numbers? Did they pull them out of the sky? Is there any substantiation to justify the numbers they are talking about?
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- Dec/9/21 12:37:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we are proposing constructive solutions to the housing crisis we are facing. The government is not coming forward with anything constructive to deal with what is a real crisis.
The government has overseen a regulatory system in our financial sector that is putting households at risk, which is leading to skyrocketing housing prices, and it is also overseeing fiscal policies that have exacerbated the problem we see in the country today. We are proposing solutions to address this, and the government is not. What is the government going to do about this situation?
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- Dec/9/21 12:38:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to have a debate in the House on the housing crisis in Canada, because that is what it is, certainly in my riding of South Okanagan—West Kootenay. The average income in my riding is $30,000 and the median house price is $900,000. It is one of the worst ratios in the country. This is affecting the labour market. People simply cannot afford to live there, so we are having a hard time finding workers.
We support parts of this motion. We support the ban on foreign investment and support the idea that governments should not be taxing people on their primary residences. However, there is not a single mention in here about affordable housing. The Conservatives are just talking about giving up federal lands for housing—
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- Dec/9/21 12:39:36 p.m.
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The hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
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- Dec/9/21 12:39:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, quite simply, here is the problem: The government's affordable housing measures are a drop in the bucket given the challenge that Canadian households are facing. Household debt in this country, largely made up of mortgage credit debt, has skyrocketed from about $1.9 trillion the first year the government was in office to $2.6 trillion in the most current year. That is a $700-billion jump in household debt. The government can come forward with all the affordable housing programs it wants, but they are a drop in the bucket of the $700 billion in additional mortgage debt and other forms of household credit debt that Canadian families have had to take on because of the government's mismanagement of housing finance.
We are focused on the root causes of the problem rather than on using band-aids that will do little to deal with the housing crisis in this country.
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- Dec/9/21 12:40:47 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we are facing a housing crisis, and the market alone will not fix it. It has failed to do so thus far.
Groups involved in housing advocacy in Quebec, such as the Réseau québécois des OSBL d'habitation, FRAPRU, federations of housing cooperatives and even municipalities across Canada are unanimous. Somewhere in the process, the federal government must invest money to house the most vulnerable. The market alone will never do it.
If the Conservatives were in power, would my colleague agree that the government should invest 1% of its budget to house the most vulnerable in this country?
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- Dec/9/21 12:41:31 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree. We need more affordable housing in this country.
However, no matter how much money the government puts into affordable housing programs in this country, it is not going to address the underlying problem, which is our skyrocketing levels of household indebtedness and skyrocketing housing prices.
Governors of the Bank of Canada only have one or two tools at their disposal to deal with monetary policy: the overnight rate and quantitative easing. The government has an immense number of tools available at its disposable. It has dozens and dozens of tools through finance regulation, CMHC and OSFI to get a handle on this problem, tools it is not using to deal with the underlying problem.
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- Dec/9/21 12:42:26 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to expand upon the question I posed to my colleague across the way. There are serious fundamental flaws with this motion. Over the years I have seen many opposition motions. When I look at this motion, I really do not know where it is coming from. I do not know what math the member for Carleton, who is likely one of the authors behind it, used.
I want to be very specific about clause (a), which reads, “review and consolidate all federal real estate and properties in Canada in order to make at least”, and I would underline this part, “at least 15% available for residential development”. The member who introduced the motion said there are 41 million hectares, so it would be 15% of that 41 million hectares. Basic math tells me that we are talking about over six million hectares.
An hon member: That is ridiculous.
Mr. Kevin Lamoureux: The Conservative member says it is ridiculous. It is a Conservative motion. I agree it is ridiculous.
Let us think about it. Parks Canada has 35.7 million hectares, Environment Canada has 2.3 hectares and National Defence has 2.2 million hectares. If we add up those three, it equals 40 million hectares. The Conservatives are saying 15% of 41 million, so are they suggesting that we get rid of parklands? Yes, based on their own numbers, they are. I do not understand where the Conservatives are getting their numbers. When we read the motion, we see that this is just one example.
Most take housing very seriously. Some understand that the national government has a role to play. I have been a parliamentarian long enough to have witnessed Conservatives oppose any sort of investment in housing from a national government perspective. When I was first elected back in 1988 to the Manitoba legislature, I was given two titles: deputy whip and critic for housing. Provinces play a critical role in housing. Municipalities are creations of provincial laws passed in provincial legislatures. Municipal and provincial governments have predominantly played the lead role in housing in Canada.
I remember having a debate with NDP member of Parliament Bill Blaikie back in 1993, in which I said the national government needed to play a stronger role in housing, but Bill Blaikie argued that was not the case. I represent a riding in Winnipeg North where there has been a need for social housing for decades. It was marginally addressed in 15 years of a provincial NDP administration. Political parties of all stripes need to do a little reflection and come to the table about what can be done, but to say that this government has not been concerned about housing is so misleading.
We would have to go back generations, 50-plus years, to find a prime minister or government that has done more for housing at the national level. The opposition could not show, over the last 50 or 60 years, a prime minister who has committed more financial resources to support Canada's housing. That can be substantiated by real dollars and real commitments. It is easy for the NDP to click their heels and say it will build 500,000 homes.
I kind of miss Adam Vaughan. He had a way of expressing the degree in which the Liberal Party and this government understood the housing issue and the many ways in which we were tackling that problem.
However, I can tell members that it will take more than the federal government to resolve this issue. Yes, the federal government has a role to play. Since 2015, we have seen hundreds of millions to billions of dollars go to the first-ever national housing strategy, which was put in place by the Prime Minister, by this government, which is something no other opposition party in the last six years, or prior to that, argued for. There are plans out there, and there are real, tangible dollars being put forward and on the table. However, we recognize that we need to get partners. We have worked very hard at having provinces and municipalities do what they can and play the role they need to play.
We have a very proactive Minister of Housing, and he is out in the communities virtually every day. We thought of making him an honorary member of Parliament for Manitoba because of his interest in Manitoba and the presence he has had in the province of Manitoba. He genuinely cares for all regions of our country and understands the issues of housing, whether it is in Vancouver, Montreal, Halifax or the many rural municipalities out there.
We understand, whether it is the Prime Minister or the Minister of Finance, how important it is that we fight to have adequate homes for all Canadians where they can feel comfortable. We can provide that hope. This is something we are not only striving for, but that we can also cite examples of. However, when we talk about those examples, opposition members will say that we are patting ourselves on the back.
This government has likely accomplished more on housing than the previous Harper government. I do not know the actual number, but I think we are at or getting close to 100,000 homes or units in the last number of years under this administration. There are about 300,000 that the government has assisted with in some form of repair. There is also the ongoing support of tens of thousands of non-profit housing units, which is something the federal government continues to commit to and look at ways of expanding.
I hear, especially from my New Democratic friends, talk about the importance of housing co-ops, and I agree. Housing co-ops are important, which is one of the reasons we were there, shortly after we got elected back in 2015, to support housing co-ops that were having great difficulty because of mortgages and related issues. We supported a number of housing co-ops, and the minister is very open to looking at how we can expand housing co-ops.
We want to talk about a resolution, and the NDP members are not too far off on this. They are talking about indigenous leaders coming forward to the table with indigenous housing plans. We have to appreciate indigenous people's housing needs and how we can support it.
However, there are many other types of housing programs. If we take a look at Canada's housing stock, we get a better appreciation. There is a need for us to make sure that we maintain that housing stock.
We came out with a program just last year called the Canada greener homes grant. It is $5,000 for people to improve their homes. A few hundred thousand people could be eligible for that particular grant. That improves the quality of homes in our current housing stock, which does help out significantly. It is better for our environment. It creates jobs. It improves the housing stock.
I am a big fan of encouraging and promoting members in our communities to get engaged in housing co-ops. Housing co-ops and condominiums are great ways to get people engaged in ensuring they will be able to have ownership because there is a big difference between a tenant and someone who is a resident in a co-op. A resident in a co-op has a vested interest. It is his or her community in a very real way. It is a big difference from being a tenant, and I am a strong advocate of it, as I know many of my colleagues are.
We have organizations in our communities, and I want to give a special shout-out to Habitat for Humanity Canada, particularly here in my city of Winnipeg. Habitat for Humanity has done more than three levels of government for building new homes in our communities. It definitely has done a super fantastic job in Winnipeg North. Whether it is in Point Douglas, along Selkirk Avenue, in the Maples or everywhere in between, new homes have been popping up in Winnipeg North, and it is because of Habitat for Humanity. The work they do bring people together to ensure that people who would not normally have the ability to get a home do, in fact, become homeowners.
I have raised this organization as a model organization that government should get behind, and I am glad that the federal government today is providing some support. I would appeal to the current minister to continue that support. Habitat for Humanity is an organization that I believe has a very important role to play in dealing with the housing crisis we are in. The people who are involved in organizations like Habitat, because there are other organizations, also need to be taken into consideration.
We have resident groups, as an example, in our communities. We have advocates for people who are financially challenged. We have people who do not have homes. There are so many people who are out there. The idea of having that debate on the floor of the House is far better than what is being proposed today, even though I am still allowed to talk about it, but that is not what we are actually voting on.
What we are voting on has significant flaws to it. I made reference to the land usage, and yes, we need to see more land and more homes. That is nothing new. We all know that, but it is not going to be the federal government releasing 41 million hectares and closing down our parks and so forth. The way we are going to see the number of homes that are needed being built is not by Ottawa opening the purse and building them all.
Ottawa needs to keep doing what is has been doing, coming to the table with substantial financial resources, working with the different organizations and levels of government, trying to develop a strategy that will see more homes being built in our communities. That is why the motion before us misses the mark.
The primary recommendations I would have put forward in a resolution dealing with housing in Canada would be all-encompassing. They would address the finances, but I do not believe there is a member in the House who can say that as a government we have not committed enough financial resources. If members attempt to do that, I would ask them to reflect on their own election platforms.
We are at the table. We want to work with the different stakeholders toward a resolution that encourages not only Ottawa, but provincial jurisdictions of all political stripes and municipalities of all different sizes to recognize that we have a national situation, from coast to coast to coast, with which Canadians want us to deal. We want to build the consensus. We want to see the different levels of government move forward on the file. We want to empower the many different stakeholders that have the ability to contribute.
The riding of Winnipeg North has a lot of things within it that could be carried throughout the country, such as the demographics and economic fabric of the community. In Amber Trails, for example, beautiful brand-new homes are being built, ranging from $600,000 to $700,000 or even more. More modest homes, around the $300,000 range, are being build in Tyndall Park. Some of the older and more established homes with a great deal of character are in the traditional north end, ranging from $150,000 to $200,000 in the Point Douglas area. I could be out somewhat with my prices, but the point is that we need to take a holistic approach to dealing with housing in Canada.
For the first time in generations, the Prime Minister, the Minister of Housing and the Liberal caucus are committed to being at the table and making a difference when it comes to housing. We would appeal to all members of the House of Commons to get on board, to realize what actually is on the table and to start to work with the different levels of government. They can talk to their MLAs, city councillors, rural municipal reeves and mayors, and reach out to organizations like Habitat for Humanity and the many other non-profit social progressive-minded organizations and others to tap into how they might be able to contribute to a housing plan, a plan that the Prime Minister and all of us want to see.
People have a right to have a home. We need to continue to talking about that and saying it. It is important we do that.
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- Dec/9/21 1:02:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to debate with the member for Winnipeg North around one specific point. He is misrepresenting the motion before us.
In the previous election, we said that we would like to review “the extensive real estate portfolio of the federal government – the largest property owner in the country with over 37,000 buildings – and releasing at least 15 per cent for homes”, while improving the federal lands initiative.
The government has properties within places like Toronto, like Ottawa and even just across the bridge in Gatineau, Quebec. We are talking about taking existing structures that the federal government has and going to the provincial and the not-for-profit societies, saying that we have land that can be reconverted. They may be able to take the existing envelopes and translate them into apartments for people who need them.
Would the member agree that the federal government has these properties and its right place is to give those properties? Especially since we have so many people working from home now, this becomes more and more of an option.
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- Dec/9/21 1:03:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am happy the member seems to be backing away from the Conservative idea of the 41 million hectares. He can read the speech of the Conservative member who brought that idea forward. I am happy to hear the Conservatives are retracting that. It makes sense.
With regard to his specific question, the federal lands initiative is already happening today. He can look at it. I am very proud of the fact that in south Winnipeg, what used to be Kapyong Barracks is being redeveloped for housing, an indigenous-led initiative.
We are very much aware of our current stock. That is why we established the federal lands initiative, to do exactly what—
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- Dec/9/21 1:04:34 p.m.
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The hon. member for Repentigny.
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- Dec/9/21 1:04:39 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in his speech, my colleague from Winnipeg North spoke a lot about how much money the government has invested. In reality, most of this money has been invested on paper. We now know that many programs and initiatives are expected to spend just a small amount of that money. This is not something the Bloc Québécois is saying; it is coming from the Parliamentary Budget Officer.
I encourage my colleague to urge his government to spend money and start large-scale construction of housing units.
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