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44th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION
EDITED HANSARD • No. 189
CONTENTS
Tuesday, May 2, 2023
House of Commons Debates
Volume 151
No. 189
1st SESSION
44th PARLIAMENT
OFFICIAL REPORT (HANSARD)
Tuesday, May 2, 2023
Speaker: The Honourable Anthony Rota
ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS
[Routine Proceedings]
[English]
Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act
moved for leave to introduce Bill C-331, An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act (duty of candour).
She said: Mr. Speaker, I rise today to table my private member's bill, Bill C-331, an act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act on duty of candour. It is the result of widespread public consultations across Canada, including with racialized Canadians, who are more likely to have negative interactions with security officials.
The bill seeks to amend the CSIS Act in the following ways: by including information about the number of breaches of the duty of candour in the annual classified report by the CSIS director to the Minister of Public Safety and the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency, along with a brief description of each and any remedial action; by requiring that the same information be tabled annually in the House by the minister in an unclassified form; and by amending the oath of office sworn by CSIS officials to include a duty of candour oath to the courts.
Our security agencies cannot be effective without the confidence of Canadians, and they have a lot of work to do to earn their trust. Trust needs transparency, and this bill is an important step to bringing transparency to our security agencies.
(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)
Petitions
Mr. Speaker, I have three petitions to present today.
The first petition comes from a group of Canadians who want the Canadian government to recognize the politicization of the judiciary of Hong Kong and its impacts on the legitimacy and validity of criminal convictions. These Canadians want the Canadian government to affirm its commitment to render all national security law charges and convictions irrelevant and invalid in relation to paragraph 36(1)(c) of the IRPA. As we know, there are many Hong Kongers who have made Canada their place of refuge, fleeing Communist oppression in mainland China, as my family did many years ago from a different Communist country, that of Poland.
Mr. Speaker, I am also presenting a petition on behalf of my constituents, as I have done many times in the House, on the continuing, ongoing genocide by the Taliban regime of ethnic Hazaras, a minority Shia community in Afghanistan.
Again, the petitioners are calling on the Government of Canada to recognize the ongoing genocide and the persecution of Hazaras, as well as to include Shia Hazaras in the 40,000 refugees to be resettled in Canada by the end of this year.
Mr. Speaker, with everything happening now happening in Sudan, my third and last petition is drawing the attention of the House to the ongoing violent conflict in the Tigray region in Ethiopia and the egregious human rights violations, particularly with the humanitarian crisis. They are calling for the following five things: to immediately call for an end to violence and for restraint from all sides; to immediately call for humanitarian access to the region for independent monitoring; to immediately call for international investigations into credible reports of war crimes and gross violations of human rights; to engage directly and consistently with the Ethiopian and Eritrean governments on this conflict; and to promote short-, medium- and long-term elections monitoring in Ethiopia.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of 18,385 Canadians to present a petition calling on the government to ban the sale and use of glyphosate and to protect human health and the environment. The petitioners note that the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as a probable carcinogen to humans.
Glyphosate is Canada's most widely sold pesticide. Canadians are consuming glyphosate residues in their food and water every day. The use of glyphosate also harms aquatic and terrestrial species and causes a loss of biodiversity.
The petitioners are calling for action and for the government to develop a comprehensive plan to reduce overall pesticide use in Canada.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition signed by Canadians. The petitioners are concerned about the government's failure to stand up for the rights of victims. This is in the face of the Supreme Court of Canada's unjust decision to strike down a law passed by the previous Harper Conservative government that gave judges the discretion to apply consecutive parole ineligibility periods for mass murderers. As a result of this decision, some of Canada's worst killers have seen their sentences significantly reduced.
The petitioners are calling on the government to use all tools available, including invoking the notwithstanding clause, to override this decision.
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise in this place today to raise the concerns of many Canadians and petitioners related to the pesticide glyphosate. This herbicide is commonly used in Canada under the trade name Roundup. The herbicide glyphosate has been judged by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, within the World Health Organization, as a probable human carcinogen.
The petitioners note that the increased use of glyphosate has been tracked along with the increased use of genetically modified plants to be so-called Roundup-ready. The petitioners call on the Government of Canada to act on these facts and protect health.
Mr. Speaker, a very popular petition in Winnipeg relates to the growing Indo-Canadian community and, with that growth, a large demand for more international flights. In particular, this petition calls for flights that fly out of the Winnipeg international airport into Europe and such countries as India, specifically Amritsar.
It is with pleasure that I present this petition, recognizing the exceptional growth and the need for more international flights. The petitioners call upon international airlines and government MPs to do what they can to get those flights.
Mr. Speaker, I rise once again to present a petition regarding the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. The petitioners wish to bring to the attention of the House the fact that the Chinese government has waged a nationwide persecution campaign against Falun Gong practitioners. This has resulted in arrests, with many being imprisoned for up to 20 years. They add that this includes torture and abuse. As they also indicate, investigators have concluded that tens of thousands of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience have been put to death and that their organs have been seized involuntarily for sale at high prices.
The petitioners call on this Parliament to pass a resolution to establish measures to stop the Chinese Communist regime's crime of systemically murdering Falun Gong practitioners for their organs, amend Canadian legislation to combat forced organ harvesting and publicly call for an end to the persecution of Falun Gong in China.
Mr. Speaker, the petition I am presenting today relates to the carbon tax. The petitioners are concerned about how the government's carbon tax is continuing to drive up the cost of home heating and the cost of living for Canadians. They note that heating one's home in the winter in Canada is not a luxury; it is a necessity. Nevertheless, as the petitioners point out, the government is planning to triple the carbon tax.
Therefore, the petitioners call on the House of Commons to cancel the tripling of the carbon tax on home heating, to ensure no new taxes are imposed on Canadians and to ensure that Canadians are being put first, including their families, their paycheques, their homes and their futures.
Questions on the Order Paper
Request for Emergency Debate
[S. O. 52]
I wish to inform the House that I have received a notice of a request for an emergency debate. I invite the hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle to rise and make a brief intervention.
Mr. Speaker, I am rising to request an emergency debate on the issue of foreign interference by the Communist regime in Beijing. The Globe and Mail published a report yesterday morning indicating that families of members of Parliament have been subjected to an intimidation campaign orchestrated by PRC officials working out of Beijing's consulate in Toronto. In at least one case, this intimidation was in direct retaliation for a member's vote on a motion that the House adopted recognizing the PRC's treatment of Uyghurs as a genocide.
The reports are informed by top secret information from Canadian intelligence services. Beijing's intimidation tactics are not limited to members of Parliament but are being deployed against many Canadians of Chinese descent in diaspora communities across the country. These allegations are widely reported and well established through House of Commons committee testimony and reports by Canada's security establishment. They report it as a matter of fact that Beijing has sought and continues to seek to influence and intimidate Canadian citizens.
The facts that this retaliation was in direct response to a vote in the House, that we just learned about this yesterday and that the Prime Minister did not answer multiple questions in the House yesterday, I believe, add weight to my request for an emergency debate. I note that there is a take-note debate this evening, Mr. Speaker, so I would encourage you to consider granting it either after that take-note debate expires or tomorrow evening at the end of Government Orders.
[Speaker's Ruling]
I thank the hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle for his intervention. However, I am not satisfied that the request meets the requirements of the Standing Orders at this time.
Order, please. Does the Leader of the Opposition have something to say to the Chair?
Actually, he does have something to say. You asked me if I had something to say; I do have something to say. I think it is outrageous. We stand in this Parliament to represent our constituents, and we need the ability—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Government Orders
[Business of Supply]
[English]
Business of Supply
Opposition Motion—Home Ownership and Renting Affordability
That, given that, after eight years of this Liberal Prime Minister's inflationary policies,
(i) inflation has reached a 40-year high and is forcing Canadians to cut back on the basic necessities of eating, and heating their homes,
(ii) monthly mortgage costs have more than doubled since 2015 and now cost Canadians an average of $3,000 per month,
(iii) Statistics Canada reports that "mortgage interest cost rose at a faster rate in March (+26.4%) […] this was the largest yearly increase on record as Canadians continued to renew and initiate mortgages at higher interest rates",
(iv) government fees, taxes and delays now add on average $200,000 to the cost of every new home in Canada,
(vi) nine out of 10 young people who do not own a home believe they never will,
(vi) nine out of 10 young people who do not own a home believe they never will,
(vii) recent reports state that a couple is paying $2,450 to rent a single room in a Toronto townhouse, that they have two other roommates, and they consider this an "excellent deal",
the House call on the government to make renting affordable and home ownership a reality for more Canadians by enacting policies that will remove big city gatekeepers, NIMBY local politicians who block construction of new housing, and unnecessary red tape by:
(a) tying federal infrastructure dollars for municipalities to the number of new homes built, and imposing clawbacks on municipalities who delay new home construction;
(b) tying federal funding for major transit projects to cities that pre-emptively "up-zone" lands around transit infrastructure for high-density housing so that young and middleclass people don't need to use cars; and
(c) making available 15% of under-utilized federal properties across Canada for new housing while guaranteeing an appropriate ratio of affordable units in the developments.
He said: Mr. Speaker, let me say at the outset that I find your ruling baffling. We have a member of Parliament who was threatened—
The parliamentary secretary to the government House leader is rising on a point of order.
Mr. Speaker, there is a tradition of the House, whether here in Canada or in the United Kingdom, which is that we respect the Speaker. I was patient as the leader of the official opposition stood in his place as you read the motion. When you made your ruling, the leader of Canada's Conservative Party yelled across—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
We will look at that before we go any further.
Please, it is not often that the Speaker explains himself, but this is an urgent matter that was brought up, and it was seriously looked at.
One thing that comes up when making a decision about whether we actually have an emergency debate is whether we have an opportunity to debate this in the near future, immediately. The hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle asked for tomorrow night, which is late tomorrow night, which is fine if there is no other time. However, if the hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle and the Leader of the Opposition find it so important, they would use their opposition day on Thursday to debate it because it is that important to them. That is the reasoning behind it.
The hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle is rising on a point of order.
Mr. Speaker, it is just that this issue is so pressing. We have members of Parliament who are being asked to debate and vote—
I am sorry, but that is not acceptable.
The hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby is rising on a point of order.
Mr. Speaker, this is profound disrespect for your role as Speaker of the House. We know that, for an emergency debate, you make a ruling. You have made it and I would ask that if we continue to get disruption—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Mr. Speaker, I believe that the Conservative Party is, right now, showing profound disrespect to your office as Speaker, and it needs to stop doing that and start the debate on its motion.
We have a debate about to start. I would remind the hon. members about relevance, how it should be enforced in the chamber and how it hopefully will be enforced over this debate, so that we all stay in line.
The hon. Leader of the Opposition is rising on a point of order.
I will remind the Speaker that we will decide what is relevant to our speeches and that he should not shut us down.
We think it is an emergency when any member of Parliament faces threats against his family related to the votes conducted on the floor of the House of Commons. Nothing is more basic to our democracy than the ability of members to vote for their constituents' interests and to not have to vote in order to protect their family members from threats and violence.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North is rising on a point of order.
Mr. Speaker, the member knows that we are not supposed to be challenging the Speaker and he continuously challenges you, as the Speaker, by not sitting down—
Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member for Parry Sound—Muskoka.
What we have today, with the Prime Minister's housing crisis, is double trouble. Since the Prime Minister took office and since he promised to make housing affordable, the average cost of a mortgage payment has doubled, from $1,400 a month to over $3,000 a month. The average cost of rent in Canada's 10 biggest cities has doubled, from about $1,100 to over $2,000 every single month. The average required minimum down payment for a house in Canada has doubled, from $22,000 to $45,000. This is all since the Prime Minister became Prime Minister and promised that he was going to make housing affordable.
This is not just an inconvenience. This is not just a case where politicians stand up and say that Canadians are having trouble making ends meet or putting food on the table, as politicians always like to say. This is becoming possibly the single biggest socio-economic crisis in my lifetime, as an entire generation of young people have come to accept, for the first time in Canadian history, that they will not be able to afford a home.
Let me share with members the mathematics of hopelessness. I was speaking to a young lady who is 28 years old and is a CATSA screener at Toronto Pearson Airport. She calculates that, at her current rate of savings, about $5,000 a year, it will take her somewhere in the neighbourhood of 20 years to save for a down payment in Toronto. That means she will be well over 40 and unable to have kids. The hopelessness is not that she cannot afford a home; it is that her calculator tells her she will never be able to afford a home.
It would be nice and comforting for the Prime Minister if he could claim that this problem is out of his hands and that it is the result of some crazy global phenomenon that is not in his grasp, and therefore that he is once again just a passive observer in the misery that the Canadian people are living, as he so often tries to portray himself. The stats prove otherwise. This problem does not exist in the vast majority of countries in our peer group around the world. For example, last year, Fortune magazine concluded that the standard home in Canada now costs twice as much as it does in the U.S. Can the Prime Minister explain this? Prices are determined by supply and demand. The U.S. has 10 times the demand because it has 10 times the population. It has a smaller supply because its land mass is more confined and less than ours. It has 10 times the demand and less supply, yet, according to Fortune magazine, the prices in the U.S. are half what they are here in Canada.
Around the world, we see other examples. Vancouver, in NDP British Columbia, is now the third most overpriced housing market in the world according to Demographia. Toronto is the 10th. Both are more unaffordable than Manhattan, Los Angeles, London and even Singapore, an island where there is literally nowhere left to build. All these are places with more money, more people and less land, yet their real estate is more affordable than ours.
The practical consequences of this are that, for example, almost one-third of homeowners with a mortgage will pay off that debt over more than a 30-year period, due to higher interest rates, a significant increase over the once-standard 25-year amortization. The average rent for a spare bedroom, just the bedroom and not the overall housing unit, in a home, condo or apartment in Vancouver was $1,410. Let us put this into perspective. There are now couples who consider it a bargain to move into a townhouse with two other couples, each couple renting a single room, often sharing a bathroom, always sharing a kitchen, and paying $1,500 a month just for that room. Here in Canada, this is true housing poverty, and it has happened after eight years of the Prime Minister's policies.
Why is housing so unaffordable? First, government deficits are driving up interest, which increases the mortgage rates for people with debt. Second, we have the fewest houses per capita in the G7 even though we have the most land to build on. Why is that? The answer is that government gatekeepers block housing construction. It takes up to 10 years to get a building permit. We rank 64th in the world for building permit delays. We rank second-last for the speed at which we approve building permits within the OECD. Every other country but one in that group is faster to deliver permits and allow houses to be build. This blocks construction and prevents Canadians from owning a house. We know this problem is worse in NDP-controlled British Columbia, where hard-left, woke mayors who stand up for the wealthy mansion owners in leafy, ritzy neighbourhoods block the poor, the immigrants and the working class from ever owning homes. Therefore, we do not have enough homes, and that is why Canadians do not have a place to live.
The government wants to bring in half a million people per year, which is a million people over the next two years, and it has no plan to build the houses to go along with that. In fact, since the current Prime Minister took office, we have fewer houses per capita than we did eight years ago. In other words, this problem is metastasizing and worsening every single day. The only party with a common-sense plan to fix it is the Conservative Party, and this is the plan.
The government has put $89 billion into housing programs. Government housing is not the solution. It is not working because, if there is a confined space of permitted land to build on, we could pour as much money as we want into it and we are not going to get more housing; we are going to get more expensive housing. Worse still, the Prime Minister has announced $4 billion more, not for housing, but for the gatekeepers. The money is literally going to go to the zoning and permitting departments of the big cities that are blocking the construction in the first place. In other words, it is a big, fat reward for those same bureaucrats who are blocking our youth from having homes, and that will build out the bureaucracy and slow down the construction.
Here is my common-sense plan. We will link the number of dollars big cities get for infrastructure to the number of houses that actually get built. Those who block construction will be fined. I will cut back their infrastructure. Those who speed up and lower the cost of permits to build more will get a building bonus from my government because incentives work. I will require every federally funded transit station to have high-density housing on all the available land around and even on top of the station. We will sell off 6,000 federal buildings to convert them into affordable housing for our young people to live in. We will speed up immigration for building trades. We will shift more of our education dollars over to the trades, rather than just to the white-collar professions.
We have seen the way. We can look at what the Squamish people have done in the city of Vancouver. They have their own land and do not have to follow the rules of the gatekeepers. They are building 6,000 units of housing on 10 acres of land. The Squamish have shown what can happen when we get the gatekeepers out of the way. That is exactly what we are going to do right across the country. We will clear the gatekeepers. We will remove the privileged class inside the castle walls and open the gates of opportunity up to anyone who is prepared to work hard. If people work hard in this country, the rules should allow that they have a decent home where they can start a family and raise kids. It is common sense, the common sense of the common people united for our common home, their home, my home, our home. Let us bring it home.
Madam Speaker, when the leader of the Conservative Party sat around the cabinet table, the Harper government did absolutely nothing when it came to housing. If we contrast that with the current government, we have invested literally billions of dollars into housing, developed a housing strategy, and worked with the different provinces and the many different for-profit and non-profit stakeholders.
My question for the leader of the official opposition is this. Will he not recognize that, although Ottawa has stepped up to the plate and contributed in virtually every way, even though the Conservative Party has opposed many of those measures, the provinces, municipalities and other stakeholders also need to step up in order to resolve Canada's housing issues?
I want to remind members that I know the Leader of the Opposition is very capable of answering the question, and he does not need his MPs to help him on this.
The hon. Leader of the Opposition.
Madam Speaker, first, it would have been better if that government had done nothing. Nothing would have been better than what it did in reality.
If the member wants to compare records, when I was the responsible housing minister, housing costs were half of what they are today. The average mortgage payment required on the average house was $1,400, and now it is $3,000. The required amount of a person's paycheque to make monthly payments on a house was 39%, and now it is 70%. The average rent was $1,100, and now it is $2,200. The average down payment was a modest $22,000, and now it is $45,000. These are just the results.
It is true that the Liberals have far more expensive housing programs, but that is a double loss. It means that not only are homebuyers paying more; now taxpayers are paying more. Under the Conservatives, both of them would pay less.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I closed my eyes at times during the Leader of the Opposition's speech, and it felt like I was listening to an NDP member. It shocked me to hear such words coming out of the mouth of the leader of the official opposition. It is no secret that housing is an area of provincial jurisdiction. Who could manage housing needs better than the municipalities themselves?
Let me double-check something. I hear the Conservatives talking about penalizing municipalities that do not build enough new properties, new houses or new housing units. Does that not seem centralizing? Is it not the opposite of what the Conservatives usually preach? Can the Leader of the Opposition tell me if he agrees that no one knows housing needs better than the municipalities? Would he agree that what they need most from the federal government are adequate funds?
Madam Speaker, what an ironic question from the centralist Bloc. BQ members say they want to be independent, but what they really want is to be dependent. Every day, they rise in the House to call for a bigger, stronger federal government. We do the exact opposite of that.
The member asked whether the federal government should give the municipalities money. At the federal level, we are responsible for the money we spend. Yes, I will make sure the money we spend is used to build affordable housing for Canadians, not the overpriced new builds we are seeing now.
Are municipalities actually in the best position to handle this? Unfortunately, big cities like Toronto and Vancouver have done a very bad job. We are done saying yes to everything these incompetent mayors and local politicians ask for. They are the ones causing this housing crisis. The Conservative government will demand affordable housing. We will get rid of the guardians of privilege and get more houses built. That is plain old common sense, and that is what we are going to do.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I thank the opposition for raising the motion today. I hope the member actually apologizes. I saw him become unhinged in this chamber before and call the Speaker a damn disgrace. He actually apologized to me in the past—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
This was dealt with a while ago. I would ask the hon. member to ask his question, because we are running out of time. It should be reflective of the motion before the House.
The hon. member for Windsor West.
Madam Speaker, I do think it is relevant; it sets the tone in this chamber. At the same time, I will ask, quite quickly—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Order, please. I would ask members to allow the hon. member to ask his question.
The hon. member for Windsor West.
Madam Speaker, I will go directly to the question. I will simply ask this. When he closed veterans' offices in my riding, was that a benefit to them getting housing or was it a distraction? I would like to know what he says about that.
Madam Speaker, the average veteran could buy a house for half of what he or she pays right now. Housing was actually affordable when we were in government.
When I was the responsible minister, people could get a house with half the mortgage payment, or rent an apartment with half the rent, or make half the down payment or spend a third less of their paycheque on monthly payments. That was the reality.
What we have now is a costly coalition of the Liberals and the NDP that protect the privileged by blocking housing construction. That is why the working class, the good, decent working class people who used to support the NDP, are abandoning that party as it has joined with the elitists over in the Liberal Party, and they are now standing for the common-sense Conservatives.
There is no doubt that there are differing views, but I would ask everybody to be respectful during the debate, especially when someone has the floor.
The hon. member for Parry Sound—Muskoka.
Madam Speaker, having a place to call home should not be merely a dream in Canada. It should not be a distant memory from generations past. It must be an achievable reality for all Canadian families. Canada cannot reach its full potential until everyone has a safe bed to sleep in and a welcoming place to come home to at the end of the day.
I have had the privilege of visiting many communities in Canada, and there is a despair that too many Canadians are feeling, an emptiness that many of our fellow citizens are dealing with as the dream of having a home of their own slips further and further away from their grasp. Canada needs leaders who will turn rhetoric and words into real tangible action to get shovels in the ground now.
The housing situation in Canada is in crisis, and times of crisis require bold action and real leadership.
I have spoken in the House before about Kim Doughty. She was the catalyst who motivated her husband Claude and me to get an emergency shelter in Huntsville, six beds of emergency shelter and 10 units of transitional housing. The community rallied to the cause and we got the project built. We were justly proud of the accomplishment. We also knew it was just one step, that much more to be done.
After I was elected as mayor, I met with Kim again, and some of her housing colleagues, and she told me some heartbreaking stories about suffering and struggle. Most of it was in hiding right in our picturesque Muskoka.
What Kim told me that day years ago is the same thing we hear today in our communities all across the country. Housing is more than economics. It is more than shovels, dirt and wood. For too many, it is literally life and death. If the leaders of all levels of government took up the cause of combatting this crisis, we would do more than just make our communities more affordable; we would literally save lives.
At that time, our council and administration set to work to change policies. We made land available to developers to build, and so did the community take up the cause.
The Table Soup Kitchen was working hard at the time to open a shelter for men in Huntsville. It was very near completion when an issue arose over the fire code and access and entry points, so we were not quite ready to open it. In the midst of all of this was a young man named Paul.
Paul had his struggles, but he was a joyful fellow and well-liked in the community. He requested to stay in the shelter one night, but he was turned away because it did not have its occupancy permit yet. Therefore, he stayed in his old beat up Volkswagen van that night. When police later found Paul's van, their investigation concluded that the candle he lit, presumably to create a bit of warmth on that cold November night, had tipped over as he slept.
Huntsville lost Paul that night, and our community was devastated, as was I. I received emails from residents who were shocked and angry, some charging that Paul's blood was on my hands. Paul's father later wrote a letter to our community to thank us for welcoming his son and for making Huntsville the place Paul called home, quite proudly. He assured us that Paul's death was not anyone's fault, that Paul made his own choices and that no one was to blame. Yet, were we not? Was I not, just a little?
What more could I have done to resolve the occupancy dispute? What mental health supports were not there that should have been there? Are any of us in leadership doing enough right now?
Tragically, Paul's story is not unique. It is one that is repeated in every corner of our country.
On average, in Toronto, three homeless people die a week. The vacancy rate for rentals in Canada is 1.9%. That means there is nothing to rent. Rental rates have doubled in the last eight years of the current government. Home prices have doubled in the last eight years under the government. For the 35-year-old living in their parents' basement unable to start a family, the entrepreneur thinking of moving to another country or the company passing off the opportunity to grow in Canada because it simply cannot find a place for their workers to live, the problem is getting worse.
It is a crisis. It holds our country back from economic opportunity and prosperity. It holds Canadians back from being able to achieve their dreams. It stops us from building communities. In many cases, it is life and death.
The problem is that we do not have enough supply. Years of bad policy have left our country without enough homes for Canadians. We are not building fast enough to keep up with the rising levels of immigration. The result is that too many of the homes we have today are too expensive for too many of the Canadians who live here.
The solution is to get more shovels in the ground and build more homes faster. We must make it easier to build, easier to get permits, easier to source the skilled labour and building materials needed to get the job done. We must make it harder for the NIMBY activists and politicians who hold development up to stop them from doing that.
Unfortunately, what we get from the government is a lot of talk and no real results. We see a Minister of Housing who attends a lot of announcements, but not a lot of ribbon-cuttings, groundbreakings or grand openings. In fact, a few weeks ago, I asked the Minister of Housing if Canada was in a crisis, something his provincial counterparts, economists, housing experts and his own officials agree upon. He rambled on about political talking points and spoke about his government increasing their ambition.
In a crisis, we devote every possible resource to addressing an issue. It means bringing every single partner to the table and taking an all-hands-on-deck approach to face the challenge head on. Not surprisingly, the minister has not done this, because he does not seem to be aware of the magnitude of the problem.
Canadians deserve better than that. They deserve a country where if they work hard and play by the rules, the dream of owning a home will always be in reach. Our country deserves a government that will work hard to get shovels in the ground, as those Canadians who work hard every single day, saving and sacrificing, do their part to build a brighter future for them and their families.
This crisis is real, and the solutions we put forward must be bold. The old way of doing things simply does not work anymore. For years, housing providers from social housing, co-op housing, community groups and market-based developers have found it nearly impossible to access CMHC programs. Its procedures are convoluted, its decisions often do not even make any sense. The Auditor General's has reported that they are not entirely sure if what it is doing is having any impact. Canadians do not need the Auditor General to tell the truth. The fact of the matter is that it is not working.
Just last week, the CMHC raised insurance rates on multi-unit purpose-built rentals. It raised those premiums by almost 200%. The government's out-of-touch housing policies will continue to drive up the rent on the most vulnerable Canadians and further stall the construction of new units.
However, there is good news. The Conservatives are ready to clean up the government's mess. We are going to get the big government inaction out of the way and ensure that the federal government is no longer a barrier to getting more homes built. We are going to make available a minimum of 15% of underutilized government properties and clear the way for homes of all kinds to build on land that the government has not been using.
While we are at it, we will stand up to the NIMBY activists and cowardly politicians who plague our system, the folks who fight tooth and nail against new homes being built in our communities. The Conservatives understand that if we are ever going to ensure that the next generation, that new Canadians and that young families have the same opportunities that every person in the House has had, then we cannot allow the NIMBYs, the naysayers and the critics to stand in the way anymore.
That is why we are going to tie federal funding on all infrastructure projects for municipalities to how quickly they can clean up their act and get homes built faster. We will require that any major transit project to receive federal funding must have the land around that transit ready to go for high-density housing immediately.
Let me be clear that the Conservatives are loudly and proudly saying yes to building more homes in Canada's backyard. The days of municipal councillors being able to hold up projects and vilify homebuilders must come to an end. The days of talk, delays and deferrals must be a thing of the past.
Come the next federal election, the days of having a Minister of Housing who does not even have the courage to admit that Canada is in a housing crisis, let alone take the actions to fix it, will be done too.
As a former mayor, I can tell members that homes do not get built without leaders who have the courage, the fortitude and the conviction to make the tough decisions, some decisions that are not popular but must be made.
From coast to coast to coast, the housing crisis is claiming lives and shattering dreams. Canadians are living out of trailer parks and taking on crippling levels of debt. Sadly, too many are dying in the streets of our communities, big and small. It is time for bold action and tangible results. Working with all levels of government, trade unions, the private sector and community organizations, we will get things built.
I ask every Canadian who has ever dreamed of having a place to call his or her own, the single mom working relentlessly to build a better future for her children, the entrepreneur thinking of leaving Canada, the new immigrant dreaming of coming to Canada, the young people locked out of the housing market, the parents with young people still living in their basements, to not lose hope because we hear them loud and clear and help is on the way.
After the next federal election, the Conservative government will hit the ground running and work on day one to ensure that having a place to call home at the end of the day is not just the privilege of a few, but the reality of every single Canadian from every walk of life. A home of one's own in this magnificent Canada must no longer be just a dream; it must be a reality. The Conservatives will get our country building again. The Conservatives will bring it home.
Madam Speaker, I come from metro Vancouver, and we have had use planning there for a long time that respects and maintains agricultural land, which of course then constricts the amount of land available for housing.
I would like the hon. member's thoughts on something we saw in our home community of Surrey, where the city rezoned land for multiple-dwelling units instead of single family. The neighbourhood rose up because it was concerned about having adequate space, the schools, the rec centres and the traffic management problems of putting that much more density into what was a single-family neighbourhood. What is the member's thought on that and on how to best resolve that kind of issue.
Madam Speaker, I am a former mayor, and I was a chair of planning for many years before that. I guarantee the vast majority of these complaints come from people who just do not want change. Many, many times in planning committees we would have people come to say they did not like something, it would negatively affect the value of their property or there would be too many people.
The fact of the matter is that municipalities have official plans, governing documents that say how the municipality show grow. There is professional planning staff who recommend in favour of things because it makes sense and is good planning. Then there are the cowardly local politicians, and trust me because I dealt with lots of them, and I chastised many of them many times, would say that the people of the community do not like it. They are worried about getting re-elected.
We need to do what is right, and we need to challenge municipalities that are not doing what is right to get the job done because they are holding things up. They are making it more expensive, and it is harder and harder for young people to get into a home of their own because of their delays and tactics to stall these projects.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague, who said in his speech that he was once the mayor of a municipality. I will build on that.
In today’s motion, it is surprising to see the Conservative Party claiming that the federal government knows more about the housing needs and priorities of Quebec and the provinces than the Quebec government and the municipalities do themselves.
As a former mayor, he is aware of the importance of the municipal level and municipal politicians and how close they are to the people. Would it not be better, rather than cutting ribbons left and right, to trust those who know their citizens’ needs?
[English]
Madam Speaker, I will use a line from President Reagan: “trust, but verify.” If they are not getting the job done, they cannot be trusted. That is all there is to it.
The federal government ties strings to funding all the time. This is a crisis. People say to just trust the municipalities, to not worry about it and that one should not invade in anybody else's space. In a crisis, it is all hands on deck. People who make comments like that do not realize it. One needs to go out in the communities and meet the people who are just desperate for a place to call home.
This is a crisis, and dancing around on the head of a pin worrying about jurisdiction is not what one does in a crisis. We all need to come together to make it happen.
Madam Speaker, the member just made the comment of having “all hands on deck” in a crisis. What is missing, of course, over all these years with the housing crisis is the fact that both Liberal and Conservative governments have given a free pass to corporate landlords.
Real estate investment trusts walked away without paying their fair share of taxes to the tune of $1.7 billion for the seven largest REITs in Canada. Over the next four years, they will walk away with another $300 million. That is almost $2 billion that could be invested into housing, so why did the Conservatives give corporate landlords a free pass? Why did they not put people before profits?
Madam Speaker, I am a big fan of my colleague who asked the question, and I admire her passion for housing. REITs were a tool used by the previous government with tax treatment to create investment in an aging housing stock. Part of the problem we have in this country is that we stopped building purpose-built rental in the 1970s because the Trudeau government of the time decided it was unfair and was worried about helping private landlords.
The fact of the matter is that, once we stopped that, there was little investment in those purpose-built rentals. We are desperate for more purpose-built rentals, and we are also desperate for the purpose-built rentals to be revitalized. They are tired, and they are old. They need more investments, and REITs have actually done that.
Trying to demonize the private sector is not going to help us in this situation. We need trillions of dollars of investment in housing, and the government cannot get it done, no matter how much it thinks it can.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I would like to begin by thanking my colleague from Parry Sound—Muskoka for his motion. It gives me the opportunity to talk about something that is extremely important, not only to me, but to our government. It also gives me the opportunity to point out that we are already taking the measures proposed in the opposition’s motion. However, the party across the aisle has often, if not always, voted against all these measures.
Like my colleague who is a former mayor, I am a former city councillor. I was astonished and shocked by the comments made by the House leader of the official opposition earlier today. He said that he thinks municipalities are incompetent. I invite him to repeat that publicly so we can see the reaction of municipalities across the country. I think that we are all here to work together to provide municipalities with the necessary measures and support in the current housing shortage.
We can see how difficult things are for Canadians across the country. Families are feeling the impact of the rising cost of living, and the high interest rates are hitting them hard. Housing costs are taking a heavy toll. As a result, housing affordability is becoming one of Canadians’ major concerns. It is also one of the concerns we have as a government. As you know, we have made major investments in our recent budgets.
Housing is a basic human need. We have to make sure that all Canadians have a roof over their heads that meets their needs and helps preserve their dignity. This is also an economic development issue. The housing shortage can be felt across the country, not just in the major urban centres. In many regions of Canada, the vacancy rate is as low as 0.1%. That is unprecedented.
It is therefore crucial that we build more housing units, create more supply and make housing more affordable for both homeowners and tenants. That is why we have implemented concrete and ambitious measures to double the construction of new housing units and to meet Canadians’ needs over the next decade.
As we often say, our government adopted the very first national housing strategy. This strategy works across the whole housing supply continuum and seeks to help everyone, from the most vulnerable to those who want to purchase a property. Everyone has a role to play, including provincial governments, private businesses, community organizations and municipalities. Everyone needs to co-operate to accelerate housing construction.
This comprehensive 10-year strategy already includes investments of over $82 billion to give as many Canadians as possible a place to call home. Our government is committed to adopting a housing approach based on increased supply and the protection of human rights. Unfortunately, the Conservatives voted against every measure we presented. According to many of my opposition colleagues, we should do less.
There are no small measures or small projects; every unit we build is necessary to make the right to affordable, safe housing a reality each and every time.
[English]
I want to remind the chamber of the different measures we have put in place in the national housing strategy. I think the opposition needs a recap. This strategy is a tool kit that addresses the challenges along the spectrum of housing needs. These initiatives will help build new affordable housing, fund non-profit organizations and provide build capacity to communities. Right now, it is simply too hard to get the housing we need to build, particularly affordable housing.
The system is not working, and we need to accelerate change at the local level. That is why we recently launched the housing accelerator fund, a $4-billion initiative that will provide funding for local governments to fast-track the creation of 100,000 additional homes across the country. This fund will help cities, towns and indigenous governments unlock new housing supply by speeding up the development and approval of housing projects and incenting the development of community housing action plans.
This is a significant step in our plan to double housing construction over the next decade and make housing more affordable for Canadians. I think my colleague from Parry Sound—Muskoka will find that it directly addresses his desire to tackle municipal barriers to allow housing to be built faster.
In addition to this new fund, we are also making historic investments in proven programs that are already benefiting those vulnerable populations who need affordable housing. One such program is the rapid housing initiative. This program was created in the early stages of the pandemic to respond to urgent housing needs of our most vulnerable populations. It has exceeded all expectations. It is quickly creating more than 10,200 new permanent units of affordable housing.
Now we are investing another $1.5 billion over two years to extend this initiative. The new funding is expected to create an additional 4,500 new affordable housing units, with at least 25% of funding going towards women-focused housing projects.
Every Canadian has a right to a safe and affordable place to call home, and it is unacceptable that any Canadian experiences homelessness. That is why we are investing over half a billion dollars to continue doubling annual funding for Reaching Home, Canada's homelessness strategy.
Our historic investments in tackling chronic homelessness are already paying off. We have prevented over 62,000 from experiencing homelessness and placed 32,000 people experiencing homelessness into permanent housing. We will continue to work with all levels of government and community partners to put an end to chronic homelessness across the country once and for all.
We know that it is getting harder for many Canadians to afford increased rent or to even find housing they can afford. That is why we are making investments to rapidly increase the supply of affordable rental housing. We are also providing direct financial assistance with the cost of rent to tens of thousands of Canadians across the country through the ongoing Canada housing benefit. which is delivered by the provinces and territories, and the federal Canada housing benefit top-up of $500.
[Translation]
The national housing co-investment fund is another program that has helped us build or renovate more than 300,000 rental units for the most vulnerable Canadians. Our government advanced $2.9 billion under this fund for this purpose. We also want to make the fund more flexible and more easily accessible. We could then accelerate the creation and renovation of some 21,000 rental units for Canadians who need them the most.
Our government is also determined to protect and develop high-quality, affordable co-operative housing units. I myself lived for several years in a co-op, and I helped create three co-ops. With my mother and my brother in a wheelchair on the third floor, we could plainly see that the housing supply was almost non-existent, especially for persons with reduced mobility.
That is why our government made a major, historic investment in co-op housing. We have not seen an investment of that magnitude for 30 years. It includes $500 million to launch a new co-op housing development program to increase the number of co-op housing units in Canada, and $1 billion in loans that will be reallocated to the rental construction financing initiative to support co-op housing projects.
These measures are in addition to our $4.3-billion federal community housing initiative, which is already helping protect and build community housing for some 330,000 households in Canada.
So far, the measures I mentioned focus solely on the challenge of increasing the housing supply. Of course, as we have seen, and as we know, it is currently very difficult for Canadians to fulfill their dream of buying a house.
That is why we launched a tax-free first home savings account, where Canadians can save up to $40,000. As with an RRSP, contributions will be tax-deductible and withdrawals to purchase a first home will be non-taxable, as is the case with a TFSA. It will be tax-free in, tax-free out.
We will also continue to improve the first-time home buyer incentive so that even more Canadians can have access to it, since we need to narrow the intergenerational gap.
[English]
We have relaunched the successful affordable housing innovation fund, with a new five-year rent-to-own funding stream. This will help housing providers develop and test rent-to-own models and projects to help Canadian families across the country find a new way to transition from renting to owning a home.
We are also moving forward on a homebuyers' bill of rights, which would protect homeowners from unfair practices like blind bidding or asking them to waive their right to a home inspection.
Our new legislation to ensure housing is owned by Canadians recently came into effect. The Prohibition on the Purchase of Residential Property by Non-Canadians Act, better known as the foreign buyers act, prohibits foreign commercial enterprises and people who are not Canadian citizens or permanent residents from purchasing homes in Canada for a period of two years.
[Translation]
Lastly, I think that every member in the House can agree that one of our society’s greatest failures is the housing situation of indigenous peoples. They live in overcrowded houses that are ill adapted to the climate and their communities’ culture.
Our government is working in close collaboration with first nations, Inuit and Métis organizations to jointly develop a distinction-based housing strategy. We must do more, and that is exactly what we are doing with our indigenous partners.
In the 2023 budget, our government introduced a series of measures representing $6.3 billion in funding over seven years. This includes a $300-million investment for developing, together with our indigenous partners, an urban, rural and northern indigenous housing strategy built and drafted by and for indigenous peoples.
In the 2023 budget, we committed to paying $4 billion over seven years to roll out this strategy. Indigenous peoples are conducting and leading a national engagement campaign to inform the strategy, which will complement the three distinctions-based housing strategies already developed jointly with first nations, Inuit and Métis peoples.
[English]
All the initiatives I have mentioned build on Canada’s first-ever national housing strategy, our 10-year plan to give more Canadians a place to call home. I can say that we are nearly halfway through the strategy's 10-year timeline, and we are on track to meet very ambitious goals.
We have committed nearly 50% of the strategy’s funding. With that funding, we have supported the repair of over 298,000 homes, just shy of the target of 300,000. We have maintained the affordability status of 234,000 community housing units, which represents 60% of the target so far. We have supported the creation of nearly 120,000 new housing units out of the targeted 160,000. Those are big numbers, and there is no small project and no small unit.
I want to give a couple of examples. This morning, my colleague, the Leader of the Opposition, talked about the Squamish Nation. It was the biggest investment of the national housing strategy, with $1.4 billion for 3,000 homes and units. When he criticizes the national housing strategy, would he have said not to invest in this project?
[Translation]
La Résidence des Ateliers provides 200 housing units for seniors. At Chez Doris, 19 women found a place to stay, as well as support to get them off the streets.
[English]
Toronto Community Housing repaired 58,000 units for the most vulnerable people. Thunderbird House got 22 tiny houses. Saint John's Rose House got 12 units.
Every project counts, because there are people behind it. These are a lot of numbers, but they mean nothing if we are not helping people like Neela, a young Métis woman living in Kamloops.
When she aged out of the child welfare system, culturally specific co-housing with elders helped her gain a support network. Her new home, made possible with federal funding, gave her more than just a roof and four walls. It helped her to connect with her culture and develop her spirituality, sense of purpose and self-confidence.
There are people like Ken, from Sudbury. He is now on the road to recovery after suffering a catastrophic brain injury. His mother credits his incredible turnaround to the support he received at Wade Hampton House, an affordable assisted living community for people with an acquired brain injury. Again, this was made possible through the national housing strategy.
Here is the last of many examples: I could talk about Molly from Toronto. Over several years, Molly saw her community of Milliken Co-op start to deteriorate. New renovations and upgrades have made the co-op more accessible and climate-friendly. Just as important, they have restored community pride.
Unfortunately, this motion makes it very clear that the Conservatives are simply not serious when it comes to housing. If they were, they would know that we are already taking unprecedented action to speed up municipal housing approvals, tie infrastructure investments to housing, and convert federal lands to affordable housing. All of the measures in my colleague's motion, we are already doing those things. There is not a serious plan from the Conservatives. There are buzzwords and gimmicks.
I am going to be honest with members. When the Leader of the Opposition was minister of housing, I was actually working on a whole project. If the Leader of the Opposition, the minister of housing at that time, had just done a little bit more, maybe we would not be in this situation right now. It is easy for him to criticize, but he was minister of housing. Maybe 5% of our budget right now is what he actually managed as the minister of housing. He has no lesson to give to anybody.
The only reason we made a co-op possible when I was, at that time, a city councillor, is that provinces stepped up. We, as a federal government, came back to housing with a national housing strategy. We have no lessons to take from opposition Conservatives. They have a leader who, when he was in government, had every means to do more for every single vulnerable Canadian of this country and for indigenous communities, and he did nothing.
Mr. Speaker, I was very disappointed to hear the hon. member spend most of her time attacking the previous Conservative government. She did not mention that her government, her Liberal government, has been in power for eight years and has spent and spent and spent. In fact, it has spent somewhere in the order of half a trillion dollars. She talked about how much money her government has spent on housing, affordable housing. The problem is that it is not about how much one spends. In fact, spending has driven much of the inflation in the housing market that we see today.
I would like to ask her to explain how it is that her government has been in place for eight years and has spent a historic amount, not only on affordable housing but on many other things, yet housing in Canada has not become more affordable. It has become more and more expensive. It has doubled in price. Rents have gone up. Down payments have gone up—
Madam Speaker, that is the difference between the opposition and this government. The member talks about spending. We talk about investments in people and in their homes, and making sure that we are supporting the increase of supply of units of housing in the country, for the most vulnerable people and for the ones who want to buy a home. Contrary to my colleague here, we actually invest in people. We do not just spend money. It is easy for them to talk about spending.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned the importance of municipalities several times.
I know that she worked at the municipal level. The government says that municipalities are very important, that they are close to the people and that we need to encourage them to build social housing units, for example. How is it then that the current Liberal government is dipping into property taxes, especially with its tax on new housing under foreign ownership?
Why is the Liberal government dipping into funds that should be used to build social housing? Is that not counterproductive?
Madam Speaker, I would like to remind my colleague that the federal government, which introduced the first national housing strategy, is putting municipalities at the heart of the solution. The housing accelerator that we want to implement will enable us to support the structures of municipalities so that they can build more housing.
Municipalities receive far more money from us than they currently give. That is what we want to do. They need to be true partners, and we need to give them the means to do that.
Madam Speaker, I liked my colleague's speech, but I do not like the Liberal Party's record on affordable housing. The national housing plan was slashed by the Martin government several years ago.
The Liberals have been very slow to make the investments, which are so important. Of course, core funding is absolutely critical to building housing. The Liberals said they were serious about starting to provide adequate funding to indigenous communities in a few years. Given the crisis and the many communities that lack affordable housing, the delay is unacceptable.
My question is quite simple. Why have the Liberals not made the investments that are needed now to address this crisis and to ensure that everyone in Canada can have a roof over their head?
Madam Speaker, one thing my colleague and I agree on is that there is much more to do. Although the investments we are making right now are huge and historic, it is quite obvious that we have a lot more to do to address this shortage of affordable housing and to ensure that all Canadians across the country have a roof over their heads.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I would ask my colleague to tell Canadians and particularly our friends on the other side about the important projects that this government has achieved for Canadians, particularly with day care, helping the middle class, fighting climate change, infrastructure projects and helping refugees. Those are things that Canadians must know this government has done for Canadians in general.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, it is important to remember two things. The first is that we have lifted over 2.7 million people out of poverty. Unlike my colleagues in the opposition, this government does not view spending as a burden when it helps the most vulnerable and the families who need it most.
This government is investing in people and those who need it most. That is exactly what we are doing.
[English]
Madam Speaker, it is disappointing to me that today's motion speaks nothing of one of the largest root causes of the housing crisis we are in, and that is the financialization of housing. As I mentioned to the parliamentary secretary last night, and she knows it well, for every one new affordable unit being added to the market, we are losing 15 affordable units in the private sector. I would like to hear more from her on what she and her party are going to do to move urgently to address the financialization of housing.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, my colleague did ask me about this yesterday evening.
What I can tell him is that we all have a responsibility to ensure that more housing and more affordable housing is built. His question also relates to the whole issue of housing rights. There is also the question of the registry of owners, which is needed to curb speculation in the market in order to protect tenants' right to have reasonable rent and a decent, safe and, above all, affordable place to live.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I will bring the member to a question that I asked the Minister of Northern Affairs in committee several months ago, about how many houses were built with the rapid housing initiative and all the bluster from the Liberals about all the houses that are supposedly getting built.
A lot of money has been spent, as my colleague for Abbotsford has said, but guess how many houses were built in Yukon last year? Zero. When I asked the minister if he knew how many houses, he said he did not know. We officially asked the ministry, and their answer back to us was that they did not know either because they do not track the information.
How can we trust the government that is spending billions of dollars on housing when it does not even track the information?
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I agree with my colleague on the issue of homelessness. We need to ensure that we are tracking the information and that the programs we put in place are exactly what is needed.
My colleague asked a question about Yukon. I would be pleased to sit down with him and look at that. It is important to remember that the federal government is not a project proponent. We are there to support communities with their project needs. If the territory in question did not submit a project, then I would be happy to go and do a round table to tell people that they have access to programs and that they have to apply to get the funding they need.
Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary has good reason to criticize the Conservatives' policies, but I think that she needs to remove her rose-coloured glasses when it comes to the Liberal government's national housing strategy, and particularly the urban, rural and northern indigenous housing strategy.
Even though there is currently a policy in place, we know that the results have not been at all compelling. I would like to know what the government intends to do. This strategy was studied extensively by the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, but it is not working.
What—
I must interrupt the hon. member because we do not have much time left.
The hon. parliamentary secretary for a brief response.
Madam Speaker, what I would say to my colleague is that a strategy for indigenous housing has to be developed with indigenous peoples. What is important is not how quickly we create it but how they want to create it. What is important is how they themselves want to implement this strategy, and that is exactly what we are doing with them.
Madam Speaker, I would like to begin by saying that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Beauport—Limoilou, who is here in the House.
Yesterday, I was totally amazed, dumbfounded and impressed. I was almost moved. I was almost overcome by emotion when I learned that the Conservatives would be moving a motion on the housing crisis. I had a strange feeling that I will not name in the House but that was very, very special.
I wondered what was happening for the Conservatives to take an interest in the most vulnerable, in single mothers, in the homeless and in women who are victims of domestic violence, and what made them want to talk about the housing crisis. I could not believe it. I thought that we were finally going to have an opportunity to really talk about it and to find solutions.
Since I have been in the House, people have heard me talk about the housing crisis hundreds, if not thousands, of times. This is one of my major concerns. As the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Housing mentioned, and as everyone will mention today, the right to housing in this country is a fundamental issue, a pressing need.
I have never heard the Conservatives propose even a hint of a solution and tell us what we should do to help the less fortunate in our society. I have never heard them say what sort of investment we should make or what sort of area we should target to achieve this goal.
Let us look at where we are. What is our starting point? What is the target? What is the challenge? Where do things stand, what is the bar? According to the CIBC and the CMHC, we need 3.5 million housing units in this country over the next decade. That is the challenge, that is what we need to do.
I expected that the Conservatives would come here today with solutions, that it would be an intense debate, that we could discuss the issues. However, the only thing they are doing with this motion, and we heard it from the leader of the Conservative Party earlier, is calling other levels of government incompetent.
All the Conservatives are doing is telling the provinces and municipalities to get out of the way. They are saying that, from their office towers in Ottawa with their ties and computers, they know how many social housing units need to be built in Victoriaville, and how many people experiencing homelessness there are in Victoriaville's different neighbourhoods, and if we give them the power to act, they will be so effective, good and wonderful.
I would like to remind my Conservative colleagues that, if we do not build more social housing in Canada, if we needed the national housing strategy rolled out by the Liberals in 2017, it is because of the Conservatives.
Let us not forget that, for years, the federal government built social housing for the poorest Canadians. After the Second World War, the federal government understood that it had to become involved in one way or another in building housing units. It understood that housing could not be left to market forces alone. For 50 or 60 years, the government built housing units. It did so by sending money to the provinces to be distributed to the municipalities to build housing units. It worked, as 60% of our low-income housing in Quebec right now was provided by the federal government. At the time, we understood that we had to invest to help the poorest Canadians, and that we could not allow market forces to control something as fundamental as housing.
In the 1993 election campaign, Mrs. Campbell, who was leader of the Conservative Party at the time, said that that was over. There would be no more investments in housing. Jean Chrétien, based solely on his courage and his ignorance of the issue, said that the Liberals would continue to invest in social housing, that it was too important and basic a need. That is one of the reasons he was elected, because people understood that there was still a housing problem. Unfortunately, it did not happen. He reneged on his promise.
Are my colleagues aware of how many social housing units would have been built in Quebec if we had continued to invest as we did between 1950 and 1993? There would be 60,000 more social housing units in Quebec. Right now, it is estimated that 45,000 people are on the waiting list for low-income housing. Let us imagine if we had continued to invest. In the meantime, the Conservatives were in power. They did not reinvest either, so we lost 60,000 social housing units, and there are 45,000 people waiting for low-income housing in Quebec.
In other words, housing is under provincial jurisdiction. The federal government has money. I will not get into the details of the fiscal imbalance, but the money is in Ottawa, and the needs are in the provinces. It is not hard to understand.
A few days ago, I was in Quebec City to discuss housing with my hon. colleagues from Beauport—Limoilou and Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d'Orléans—Charlevoix. I spoke with the people from Quebec City, those who my Conservative friends call incompetent, those they are telling to get out of the way so they can get the job done instead. They told me that, if the money were to arrive tomorrow morning, they could break ground immediately, right now, to build 700 units. I do not know who calls them incompetent, but the people I spoke to understood the situation on the ground; they knew what they were saying, knew what they were talking about. We had constructive discussions about what needed to be done. I thought to myself that, while the money may flow from Ottawa, no one understands the needs of the local population better than them. They are the ones who can meet those needs.
Unfortunately, that is all there is. In fact, I was disappointed. I would have hoped for progress, for there to be a motion. Not only that, the Conservatives are like my friends in the NDP. It is interesting. The Conservatives are adopting NDP techniques. They are using blackmail for funding. They say that, unless certain actions are taken, then funding will come with certain conditions. It is always the same thing with the federal government. It is the same thing in health. It is the same thing in all areas.
The New Democrats say they want to link social housing to immigration. We need to accept a certain number of immigrants or we will not get a single penny for housing. It is completely absurd reasoning. If we accept more immigrants, we will need housing, among other things, so they promise a certain amount if we meet a certain target. It is the same thing with the Conservatives. The cheque they are promising us comes with strings attached.
The problem, however, is the underfunding from the federal government. The problem is that the existing programs do not work. The programs are poorly put together; the co-investment program and the rental housing accelerator program make affordable housing at $2,000 in Montreal. Essentially, they provide loans to private entrepreneurs. They do not create affordable housing. They do not create social housing. They have nothing to do with it. They want to see a return.
Now, they want to impose conditions when what is needed is for funding to come primarily and massively from Ottawa.
I think it is fascinating that we cannot seem to find solutions. The money is here, but the needs are there. How many people are in core housing need in Quebec alone? There are 250,000 households in Quebec in core housing need.
There is a solution. We could spend the rest of the day trying to find solutions, but organizations in this field, such as the Réseau québécois des OSBL d'habitation and the Canada-wide network, already have a solution. What we need is a dedicated fund to buy privately owned housing and take it off the market to ensure accessibility and affordability. That is the solution everyone agrees on. British Columbia just did this. It invested $500 million. That is one of the things we have to do.
True, construction is tough. It is hard to get projects off the ground. Construction costs and labour shortages complicate things. That is why we have to take existing housing off the market and make it affordable for the lowest-income households for a long period of time. That is one of the solutions the Bloc put forward.
I hope my Conservative and Liberal friends will open their eyes to the severity of this crisis and bring real solutions to the table. This is a huge problem.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I really enjoyed the member's speech and I endorse his call for an acquisition fund as part of the national housing strategy. He talked about vulnerable Canadians and supporting vulnerable Canadians through a national housing strategy. That includes seniors, homeless youth and victims of domestic violence.
Could he talk about the importance of having programs, as we have under the national housing strategy, that help those vulnerable communities as they relate to providing affordable social units to those in all provinces and municipalities across the country?
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, during the pandemic, I read a statistic that said every day in Quebec, a woman fleeing domestic violence knocked at the door of a women's shelter and was turned away. Imagine being turned away from a shelter with two children in the middle of winter because of insufficient resources.
Last week, I visited Trois‑Rivières as part of my housing crisis tour. I met a woman from Trois‑Rivières who is a victim of domestic violence, and she was living in her car with her two children. I utterly fail to comprehend how a G7 nation is willing to put up with this situation.
[English]
Madam Speaker, the member is absolutely correct in saying we have a housing crisis from coast to coast to coast, and that no matter what community one is part of, big or small, this crisis is significant.
The federal Liberal government cancelled the national affordable housing program back in 1993. As a result, Quebec and British Columbia are the only two provinces continuing to try to address the housing crisis. With that being said, the Liberals and Conservatives did nothing to address the crisis in tackling the profiteering of housing. We are now seeing escalating costs in housing for renters and home owners.
To the member's point about an acquisition fund, which is absolutely needed to support non-profits to get into the housing market, to buy up housing stock that comes onto the market, my question is this. Would he also support calling on the government to end the special tax treatment for corporate landlords so that they have to pay their fair share of taxes? We could take that money to invest it in housing.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I feel like talking about Vienna. I know that there are some Quebec mayors currently in Vienna, where 60% of the rental housing stock is social housing or community housing. This program did not start yesterday; it has been funded for 100 years.
This is a major program. The broad strokes are that new housing is built and old housing is renovated using a special tax imposed on owners of the remaining stock. In Vienna, they understand the principle of the right to housing, which we adopted in the House. They have understood it for a long time and have taken steps to implement it.
It is important to mention that in Vienna, it is not only low-income people who live in social housing. There are doctors, lawyers, and engineers who live in these residences. In Vienna, they understand the need build a rental housing stock that belongs to the community and is maintained by the community. This is a truth that we should strive to apply here on a larger scale.
[English]
Madam Speaker, my colleague talked about social housing and the problems of Quebec. British Columbia has similar problems.
Despite massive, historic amounts of spending by the Liberal government, the problem seems to be getting worse. Could he comment on that and compare Quebec's problems to British Columbia's problems?
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I spoke earlier about the $500-million acquisition fund in British Columbia. We should have such a fund at the federal level, with no strings attached. All they need to do is agree with the idea, believe that it can happen, and just write a cheque. It is the cities' job and we have nothing to do with it, but they still need funding to make things happen. We need to find a way to support the cities.
In Montreal, there is what is called the 20-20-20 bylaw, which requires that private real estate developers who build, for example, more than 60 or 80 units—I do not know the exact figure—build 20% social housing, 20% affordable housing and 20% family housing. It is not a perfect solution, because often developers choose to pay the penalty for non-compliance rather than build this kind of housing. Even still, it is not a bad solution. If we could, on a large scale, require private developers to build real affordable housing for the most disadvantaged, that would be a solution.
Madam Speaker, I will begin my speech by talking briefly about Maslow's hierarchy of needs. As you may recall, Maslow's hierarchy involves which needs are most important. At its foundation, there are the basic needs like food, clothing and shelter. If one or another of these needs is not met, it is impossible for a person to fulfill oneself or even to create strong ties with other people. It is even impossible for this person to feel safe, feel valued, have self-esteem and to trust oneself.
The current housing crisis is much broader than simply “having a roof over one's head”. It directly affects our residents and their ability to be well and fulfill themselves as human beings personally, socially and economically. This is a crisis that, in the medium term, will harm all aspects of our society. We need to be aware of that.
Yesterday, when I saw that the Conservative Party would be dedicating its opposition day to the housing crisis, I had the same reaction as my colleague from Longueuil—Saint-Hubert. I was amazed, surprised, happy, and then I read the motion. Oops. What a disappointment. The message I see there is that they do not trust those who know this issue well.
They want to reimpose conditions to ensure that the tax money collected from taxpayers living in the provinces and Quebec stays in Ottawa's coffers. That is what I understand from this opposition motion.
In short, it is as though the Conservative Party is suddenly siding with the Liberals and the NDP. I was a bit disappointed when I read the motion in its entirety, so much so, that I wondered whether we should not open up the Constitution, given that apparently no one wants to respect the Constitution and the rights and powers it sets out for each level of government. We could talk about it openly and renegotiate everything. Why not? If everyone wants to interfere in the jurisdictions of Quebec and the Canadian provinces—and even those of the municipalities—what good is a Constitution that sets out these jurisdictions? It would be better to renegotiate it properly. Then again, that is a different topic altogether.
To continue and to come back to housing, I would like to make the distinction between affordable housing, according to the Liberals' definition, and social and community housing. Affordable housing is housing that costs 10% less than market value. If market value is $2,500, there is a $250 discount, meaning rent is $2,250 a month. That is far from affordable for the vast majority of Canadians and particularly Quebeckers. Social and community housing is housing that costs a maximum of 25% to 30% of a person's total income. There are also community support, counselling and integration services near these housing units, sometimes on the same block. That is what is meant by social and community housing.
In Quebec right now, 14,000 people have core housing needs. That means that these 14,000 people have practically no housing or are living in housing that is far too small. In some cases there are nine people living in a two-bedroom apartment. Sometimes there are 15 people sharing a three-bedroom, and they are lucky they managed to get a three‑bedroom because that type of housing is rare. I will leave it at that, but that type of housing is truly very rare.
Housing is far too expensive. Even with the new builds, there is a 7% vacancy rate in Quebec City. That does not seem so bad, but the reason for that rate is that the housing is unaffordable. Rent is $1,500 for a one-bedroom, not including heat, power and utilities. It is outrageous.
Looking at the social and community housing situation, the reality is that the vacancy rate is currently between 0.3% and 0.5%. This is very unhealthy. There is substandard housing in Quebec, like everywhere else in Canada, because funding to renovate those housing units was never delivered. Funding was allocated for new builds, but they were built quickly and sometimes shoddily. Absolutely no funding has been delivered to renovate them, so Quebec is left to fend for itself.
Not all housing is suited to people's needs. I am talking about individuals with reduced mobility and seniors who need adapted housing. There is none at this time. In Quebec City alone, 2,000 people are waiting for low-income housing. That is a huge number.
Renovictions are part of the problem. Private investors are buying buildings and then evicting people so they can rent out the units at staggering prices. There is also Airbnb. I am not talking about single mothers who keep one room for their child and rent it out when their child is not there. I am talking about people who use Airbnb as a business. Those people buy houses and rent them to travellers. That is problematic.
Newcomers need help to get settled. Our organizations are overwhelmed. Our community organizations themselves are looking for space. They are at that point. If they cannot find it, they are forced to close or to limit their services to those in need. That is unacceptable. The federal government in Ottawa may not be aware of this whole situation, but community organizations and municipalities certainly are.
It is therefore indecent for the government to impose all sorts of conditions on the funding so that taxpayers' money is not used to help taxpayers who really need it. It is shameful and nonsensical at best. Then members say that the Bloc Québécois is a centralizing party and that it is turning into something else. We are not a centralizing party, quite the contrary. We want the money to get to the right place, to those who know what the needs are. We are the exact opposite of a centralizing party. We are separatists. How much less centralizing can a party get?
Right now, in Quebec City, there is woman who is letting eight homeless people live in her shed. Yes, I said eight people. She would let them stay in her home, but it is barely big enough for her and her family. That is what things have come to. How did we get to this point?
We have 700 projects that are ready to go but are still awaiting funding. The funding is not there, or the project cannot be completed on budget because there is a labour shortage and the cost of labour has increased astronomically. That is not even to mention the skyrocketing costs of materials. It does not make any sense.
There are no start-up funding programs for social housing projects. There is no money for renovating existing social housing, as I mentioned before. There are no programs that would allow a private seniors' residence that is about to close down to be converted into a community seniors' residence, so residents do not have to be evicted. There is no predictable, recurrent funding for resources, for programs. These are just a few of the problems that are out there, and they all have a solution.
The reality in Quebec is not the reality in Vancouver, Fort McMurray, Iqaluit or Toronto. In fact, the realities are different within Quebec itself, which is why it is important that the municipalities do the work, not the paternalistic federal government.
In short, Quebeckers know what they need, and they do not need federal control in order to have their needs met. Independence is the only way to free ourselves completely from this control and to finally be masters in our own house and able to meet our own needs. Today's Conservative motion demonstrates exactly that.
[English]
Madam Speaker, the member said that the ratio of housing costs to income should be roughly 25% to 30%. Unfortunately, it is about twice that much in Canada, despite the best intentions of the current government and all its spending. Does she have any comments on what ideal housing affordability is and what has gone wrong with the government's plans, which have obviously failed the mark?
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I have gone through some tough times in my life, times when I had a dependent child who was in school and my husband and I were both in school and I was spending over 80% of my income on rent, so I know exactly what it is like and how difficult it can be to make ends meet at the end of the month.
A household should be spending no more than 25% to 30% of their income on rent. The problem with the existing funds and programs is that they do not cover all the blind spots. One of those blind spots involves giving subsidies to private contractors whose only objective is to make their apartment building profitable in less than five years.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I think, at least in the province of Manitoba, non-profit housing units have been in that range of 25% to 30% since 1988, but closer to 30% nowadays. The federal government, through the years, continues to contribute a majority, from what I understand, of those operating costs. I could be a little off on that, but I believe that to be somewhat accurate.
It is really important for us to recognize the need to increase the size of Canada's housing stock, and it is not going to be one government alone, nor should it be just Ottawa giving a pile of cash. We do need to see provinces, municipalities and other stakeholders step up to the same degree that Ottawa has been for the last number of years.
I am wondering if the member could provide her thoughts on other jurisdictions also playing a critical role in dealing with the housing crisis.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I want to remind the House about jurisdictions. It is Quebec and the provinces that have jurisdiction over housing, not Ottawa. The funds in Ottawa's coffers come from Quebec and the provinces. Ottawa itself is not a province.
Yes, there are programs, but as I was saying, they do not cover all the blind spots. Then, there are projects that are ready to go but that cannot move forward because of a lack of funding. Quebec has 700 such projects.
The problem is that the funds ought to be transferred directly to the municipalities, to Quebec and to the provinces, to those that know how to manage them.
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.
[English]
When we are talking about affordable housing, I think about constituents in my riding, Robin in particular. She is a senior constituent in my riding, living off a fixed income, who is currently paying 75% of her income on housing. So many others across Canada and in my riding are also in this same situation.
I am wondering if the member could clarify whether she agrees that simply adding more affordable housing supply without affordability criteria would do nothing to address the housing affordability crisis for Quebeckers trying to find an affordable home.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned several issues in her question that need to be addressed.
For starters, seniors' pensions need to be increased. Right now, they are fixed, which is a good thing, but the fixed amount is too low.
Next, simply increasing the number of housing units might have a positive impact on rents, if all needs are met. However, if companies are the only ones building housing, we end up with a situation where these companies want their housing or apartment building paid off in five or six years, so prices will keep climbing. This is unacceptable.
Madam Speaker, I want to inform you at the outset that I am proud to be splitting my time with the biggest and strongest proponent of affordable housing across the country. I am of course referring to the member for Vancouver East.
We are in a crisis, which has been brewing for many years. I will come back to that. The reality is that even though the Conservatives moved this motion today, they do not put forward much in the way of solutions. For example, they blame the municipalities. However, I know that many municipalities are doing everything they can to ensure they have affordable housing. What is often lacking is the federal contribution. The Conservatives also say that municipalities should plan. Back home, in the greater Vancouver area, municipalities are already doing that.
The Conservatives are also proposing that federal buildings be converted to housing. I would just like to mention that, during the Harper regime, the Conservatives sold off federal government assets. It is a bit rich to hear them say today that they made a mistake during their 10 years in power, that they really ripped Canada's social fabric, but that they now want to make amends and turn the federal government's assets into something useful.
What is missing from their motion? There is no mention of co-operative housing, which has been a long-standing solution in Canada. There is no mention of community housing, which is foundational in helping people access affordable housing.
There is also no mention of the role that the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or CMHC, has played over the years. The fact is, it has been very slow to provide adequate funding, and instead, it has often served to increase banks' profits. During the financial crisis, the Harper government made sure that tens of billions of dollars went to maintaining bank profits, rather than building affordable housing. We saw the same thing more recently from the Liberals during the COVID-19 crisis. Some $150 billion from the CMHC was used to prop up our big Canadian banks, rather than invest in affordable housing.
These are not solutions. One solution would be to change the aspect of our tax system that encourages investors to buy up affordable housing and convert it into housing units for the rich and wealthy. This is a terrible aspect of our tax system, one that has to change. We need to prioritize and fund affordable housing, ensuring that at least one-third of the new units built are affordable. All the things I just mentioned could improve this motion and ensure that we have a policy based on common sense. I know my colleague from Vancouver East will speak to that later.
[English]
We are in a crisis. There are hundreds of thousands of Canadians who cannot find affordable housing, and we have had a federal government that has been very slow in the pickup. The NDP has been pushing, in this minority Parliament, as we did in the last, to force the government to make these investments. We are making some progress, but it is not at all on the scale that is required.
For a time in my life, like so many other Canadians, I simply could not afford housing. I had to couch surf. I fortunately had a second-hand car that I was able to sleep in. These are the kinds of things that Canadians should not have to struggle with. There should be that right to housing, and this is something the NDP has brought forward repeatedly over the course of the last few years, which is to put in place housing policies that actually make sense.
The Conservatives are bringing forward a different motion today, and this is something that we are all rejoicing in. They normally do the carbon tax for every one of their opposition days. Today, they are finally tackling housing. However, what I was hoping to see was the member for Carleton standing up to say, “We are sorry, Canadians. We are sorry about our contribution to the housing crisis. We are sorry that we almost doubled housing prices during the Harper regime.”
Yes, the Conservatives can point to the Liberals for doing the same thing, but this tit-for-tat does not provide the affordable housing that Canadians need. I thought that the member for Carleton would stand up to say that they were so sorry that, in the last five years of the Harper regime, they lost 322,000 affordable rental units. I thought he would say that they are sorry they did that to Canadians, that they contributed, over the course of the 10 years of the Harper regime, to stripping apart the social safety net and allowing the destruction of affordable housing, with so many housing units converted to higher-priced units, so people could not afford them.
I was hoping the member for Carleton would do that, but we have not had any apologies from the Conservatives for their absolutely lamentable record over the course of that dismal decade of the Harper regime, where they stripped apart all of the protections that Canadians needed. The Conservatives basically amplified a despicable decision made by Paul Martin to end the national housing program and, instead of saying it was developing as a crisis and that they needed to address it, we saw the results.
We saw that the Conservatives did not protect those affordable housing units and did not make the investments in social housing, co-operative housing or community housing, which Canadians, seniors, students, families and people with disabilities need. The Conservatives did not do any of that. They had an appallingly bad record.
The first step the Conservatives need to take, as a party, is to recognize what a deplorable, appalling record they have. They nearly doubled housing prices with respect to market housing, and they basically did not protect hundreds of thousands of rental units that were affordable, and those that were lost to higher-priced units in conversions. These are things that Conservatives should acknowledge. These are things for which Conservatives should step up to say that they are sorry, to Canadians, for their very large part in provoking the housing crisis that exists today.
However, not a single Conservative has done that. No Conservative has stepped up to say that they were wrong to do what they did during that dismal decade and to acknowledge their contribution to this housing crisis. Yes, the Liberals are culpable as well, but the Conservatives played a significant, major and disappointing role in the housing crisis that we know today.
After the Conservatives allowed those rental units to be converted, and people with disabilities, seniors, students and families lost their affordable housing, the most reasonable person in this country would say that, really, when the Conservatives are raising in the House on the issue of housing for the first time ever for their opposition day, they should have started off by saying that they are sorry for all the neglect and everything they did that has contributed to so many people being homeless today.
Madam Speaker, I am going to rise to apologize. I am going to apologize to say sorry to the Canadians who voted in 2021 for a minority Liberal government. I am sorry the NDP signed a deal with the Liberals, with their coalition agreement, that effectively gave the Liberals a majority.
I am sorry that the NDP is complicit to many of the failed policies, including housing, which we are now debating in this House. I am sorry that the House leader of the NDP feels like somehow he needs to support the government when, in fact, he was voted for as a fourth party. Therefore, I will say to Canadians that I am sorry they did not get the government and the opposition they elected. Will this member do the same?
Madam Speaker, I do not even know where to start. That was such a strange intervention. It shows that Conservatives are still struggling with the housing issue. They know a talking point, which is that the price of housing has doubled. That is true, except that the price of housing almost doubled on their watch. When that is pointed out to them, they get very sensitive and react. They like to accuse, but they do not like to resolve.
In this corner of the House, New Democrats pushed the Harper Conservatives during that regime. As we know, it was a majority government; unfortunately, a Conservative majority has absolutely appalling results for Canadians. When they basically allowed seniors, people with disabilities and families to have their affordable housing stripped away from them, we fought back.
Of course, in this Parliament, we have been fighting for affordable housing. We make sure that we push the Liberal government to do the right thing and make the investments; in this way, we can hopefully catch up on the years of neglect.
The reality is that this housing crisis is a product of Paul Martin, the Harper regime and the current government. New Democrats are going to continue to speak up for Canadians from coast to coast to coast to make sure that housing is built. Canadians have a right to a roof over their heads at night, and we are going to continue to fight for just that thing.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, I somewhat disagree with what my colleague just said about the NDP always being prepared to support housing measures.
Before Christmas, we voted on Bill C-31, which sought to send a $500 cheque to everyone who earns less than $20,000 a year and puts more than 30% of their income toward housing. Most tenant advocacy organizations in Quebec criticized this measure, saying that it was the kind of thing a right-wing government would do. The government was just sending out cheques so that it could say that it was helping people.
That does not build housing. The government spent a lot of money sending out those one-time cheques. Obviously, they were good for people who need housing and who do not have a lot of money. However, the government could have taken that money and built housing units so that, in a few years' time, more disadvantaged people could have a roof over their heads and a place to call home.
Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what I am saying and that is exactly what the NDP is doing.
The member is well aware that, for years, the NDP has done more than any other party, and even all of the other parties combined, to promote and push for the right to housing and the right to affordable housing.
We are working and fighting for funding to be granted. That is part of our role and our mission here in the House. We will not stop until everyone in Canada has affordable housing and a roof over their head every night.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if my friend can provide his comments regarding the important non-profit sector. I think of Habitat for Humanity, which has built brand new homes and made them accessible to people who would never have the opportunity otherwise. It is a group we have invested in and supported.
Could the member provide his thoughts on both the need for additional housing and the growth of the housing co-op industry?
Mr. Speaker, New Democrats have been saying all along that we need to put in place a non-profit acquisition fund. The federal government needs to step up with core funding to ensure that we build and acquire not just non-profit housing but also co-operative housing, social housing and community housing. This is the housing mix that Canadians are looking for and that we had in this country before Paul Martin decided to rip up the national housing program and give that money to big corporations instead.
Mr. Speaker, I am happy to rise to engage in this debate today about housing. In fact, I could talk about housing all day long.
The motion before us today is indeed an interesting one. In the Conservatives' approach, per usual, they focus only on issues where they could actually put out buzzwords to rev up the community about a situation. The solutions they provide often have tremendous gaps and, interestingly, they always miss when it comes to targeting the corporate sector. I wonder why the Conservatives always think the corporate sector will take care of things, that somehow things will magically be okay, including the situation with housing. If the market were going to take care of the housing crisis, or, in fact, if the market were not going to escalate the crisis, then we would not be in this situation today.
The reality is this: When we look at the housing crisis from coast to coast to coast, we do need government intervention. I am a strong proponent of that, saying that the federal government needs to show leadership. It does not matter who is in government. Whether it is the Liberals or the Conservatives, government needs to be there for people to ensure housing as a basic human right.
The reality is that the government has not been there. That is why we have the housing crisis we face today. The Liberals cancelled the national affordable housing program back in 1993. Our country lost more than half a million units of social and co-op housing that would otherwise have been built had the Liberals not cancelled the program.
Now, I have to say that the Conservatives also did not do their part. They were in government as well. They did not invest in housing as they needed to do. More to the point, neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives invested in housing to meet the needs on the basis of housing being a basic human right. Not only that, but they allowed the market to go rampant in taking advantage of Canadians who need housing.
What happened after the federal Liberals cancelled the national affordable housing program? We started to see real estate investment trusts come into the market. They started to buy up housing stock in the community. Not only did they start to buy up the housing stock, but the government of the day also allowed them to walk away with a free pass to boot. They did not have to pay the corporate tax rate, even though, for all intents and purposes, they operate like a corporation.
As a result, the seven largest real estate investment trusts did not have to pay taxes at the corporate rate to the general revenues, to the tune of $1.2 billion. This tax should have been collected, and then the government could have reinvested that money into housing by creating an acquisition fund for non-profits, which the Liberals say they support. They should have funded it so that we could hold the housing stock. However, the Liberals did not do that.
It was not just the Liberals; the Conservatives did not do that either. They allowed this to go on and on. Now, the Auditor General and the Parliamentary Budget Officer just issued a report indicating that Canada will lose another $300 million over the next four years if we do not change the tax policy. The NDP has said on the public record that we need to stop fuelling the housing crisis. Corporate landlords need to pay their fair share, and real estate investment trusts need to pay the corporate tax rate. The money that we collect should be reinvested back into housing.
However, we do not see any of that language in this motion today. The Conservatives are saying that local governments should pre-emptively upzone a parcel of land for the development of housing. Now let us be clear: When they do that, what is happening is that the Conservatives are saying to the local government to just write developers a blank cheque. Every time a parcel of land is upzoned, that land value increases exponentially.
I am not saying we should not upzone land for further housing development, but my question is this: Why did the Conservatives not put in language to say that there needs to be a return back to the community? When we give value in land to the developers, there has to be a return back to the community to ensure that the increased value in land that they receive from the upzoning is actually going to the community in the form of community contributions, more social housing, day care spaces and green spaces, as examples. The Conservatives consistently and persistently give a free pass to the private sector; according to the New Democrats, that is wrong.
We also want to see “affordability” defined. What has happened over the years is that both the Liberals and the Conservatives have eroded the term “affordability” to the point where it is meaningless. In fact, if we talk to people in the non-profit sector, they think that when the government says, “affordable housing”, it is a four-letter word. It does not actually amount to being affordable by any stretch of the imagination.
Once upon a time, core-need housing was deemed to be affordable when rent was geared to income. That has now disappeared. It no longer exists. It exists only in theory, and that should stop. This motion should have incorporated language on affordability and defined it better.
We want to tie federal infrastructure dollars for municipalities to the number of new homes built, impose clawbacks on municipalities that delay new home construction, and ensure that there is federal funding for major transit projects to cities that pre-emptively upzone lands around transit infrastructure for higher-density housing.
The NDP is calling for amendments to this motion. We are calling for the Conservatives to accept three amendments. Specifically, we want to ensure that at least one-third of the new homes built meet core affordability needs and that at least one-third of the new homes are set, at a minimum, at 20% below market housing rent. We need to ensure that upzoning provides tangible benefits to local communities, including additional affordable housing, additional green spaces and child care spaces. We also need to ensure that the underutilized federal properties made available for housing to create new social co-ops and community housing guarantee the affordability of those units and that the value of the upzoning goes back to the community and not into the hands of the developers. That is what we need to do.
I hope that the Conservatives will support these amendments and that the language of the amendments fits what is required in this House.
I move that the motion be amended as follows: “(a) in paragraph (a) by adding after the words ‘new homes built’ the words ‘to ensure at least 1/3 of the new homes built meet core affordability needs of Canadians, that at least 1/3 is set at minimum 20% below market housing rent’; (b) by adding the following paragraph after paragraph (b): ‘ensuring that this “up-zoning” provides tangible benefits to local communities, including in the form of additional affordable housing, additional green spaces, and child care spaces, so that “up-zoning” does not just benefit developers’; and (c) in paragraph (c) by replacing the words ‘housing while guaranteeing’ with the words ‘social, co-operative, or community housing to guarantee.’”
That is the motion that I would like to move in order to amend the Conservative motion; it can ensure that we are clear in what we are talking about, that “affordability” is clearly defined and that there is a return back to the community when we upzone land so that the benefit is not just a blank cheque for the developer; rather, it is a community benefit going back to the people.
It is my duty to inform hon. members that an amendment to an opposition motion may be moved only with the consent of the sponsor of the motion, or in the case that he or she is not present, consent may be given or denied by the House leader, the deputy House leader, the whip or the deputy whip of the sponsor's party.
The hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby.
Mr. Speaker, the member for Vancouver East shared with the Conservatives a copy of this motion a number of hours ago, and so I am sure there will be somebody provided from the Conservatives. They do have a number of House officers, all paid by taxpayers, and so I am sure one of them will step up in just a moment. They have been given plenty of notice. Hopefully they will have their tie on. They should not be taking their tie off, quite frankly, but that is up to them; it is a free country.
I am sure the Speaker will get a response given the notice the NDP provided several hours ago on this amendment.
I will read it again.
It is my duty to inform hon. members an amendment to an opposition motion may be moved only with the consent of the sponsor of the motion, or in the case he or she is not be present, consent may be given or denied by the House leader, the deputy House leader, the whip or the deputy whip from the sponsor's party.
Since the sponsor is not present in the chamber, I will ask the deputy whip if he consents to the amendment being moved.
There is no consent. Therefore, pursuant to Standing Order 85, the amendment cannot be moved at this time.
Questions and comments, the hon. member for Fleetwood—Port Kells.
Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary gymnastics demonstration was very good.
As a fellow resident of Metro Vancouver, we have also seen a lot of pressure on industrial land. In fact, Vancouver is almost out of it. Does the member see the motion by the Conservative Party as further complicating or disrupting the balance we need between industrial land and residential land?
Mr. Speaker, the motion talks about housing and not industrial land. There is another whole debate I would love to get into about industrial land, but for the purpose of this discussion, what we need to focus on is the housing crisis.
I call on the Liberal government to do the right thing and show leadership by investing in social housing back to the level when the government was doing it in the seventies and the eighties. The other thing I say to the government is to stop the corporate sector from fuelling the housing crisis, stop the special treatment that real estate investment trusts get and make them pay their fair share. The government should make them pay the corporate tax rate and reinvest that money to non-profits into an acquisition fund.
Mr. Speaker, I am a fellow B.C. member, but I need to contest some of the rationalization the NDP has, the virulent hatred of real investment trusts. In places like Westbank First Nation, real estate investment trusts have offered some of the most dense purpose-built rentals that allow for workers to stay in our communities so we can have places for nurses and long-term care aides, and it is all very affordable.
It seems like the NDP is somehow saying that Westbank First Nation should not be able to put on this stock. DCCs, or development cost charges, rising taxes and CMHC raising the cost of insurance only make housing more expensive. Why does she want to stop real estate investment trusts in places like Westbank First Nation, or does she somehow believe she knows better than Westbank First Nation does?
Mr. Speaker, what I am saying, and the member knows this, is that real estate investment trusts should pay their fair share of taxes. They should not be given special tax treatment and not pay the corporate tax rate. They should be paying the corporate tax rate. Canadians are losing close to $2 billion in taxes that should have been collected and could have been invested into housing.
No wonder the Conservatives would oppose my amendment, because they always want to benefit the corporate sector and not make them pay their fair share. When I say to make them pay their fair share, in what terms? It is for that investment to go back into the community. By saying no to my amendment, the Conservatives are saying that they do not want to ensure, by giving land value with the upzoning, the return is returned to the community in the form of more social housing, green space, child care and other community benefits. That is wrong.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, there is not much point to this debate if we do not address the real problem. I am not a great economist in life, but to me, it boils down to supply and demand. According to 2016 numbers, we should be building 100,000 more housing units and, in this area too, Canada is the worst in the G7.
We are going to need to invest in housing, especially social and affordable housing, including in rural areas. That should be the real priority. The vacancy rate in Rouyn‑Noranda is around 1%. The same goes for other towns in Abitibi—Témiscamingue. This inflates prices significantly. There is nothing in the recent budget for building housing in rural areas. There is funding for indigenous housing, and I applaud that, but there is no construction planned for rural areas.
How can we address the issue of building housing in a generous and clear manner as a government policy? I would like my colleague's thoughts on that.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I absolutely agree with the member that we need the federal government's leadership in investing in housing.
That is why the NDP calls for the government to build at least 500,000 units of social housing, co-op housing or community housing, because the community deserves housing and housing is a basic human right.
As long as the approach by the Liberal government or the Conservatives is being taken, we will always have a housing crisis.
Real investment needs to be made and it needs to be done now.
Mr. Speaker, off the top, I want to note that I will be splitting my time with the member for Hastings—Lennox and Addington.
We have heard today that adequate, suitable and affordable housing provides stability and security, and contributes to the well-being of a person, yet that sense of security that comes with appropriate and stable housing is becoming further out of reach for many Canadians. This is particularly true when it comes to young Canadians.
Eight years into the Liberal government and its inflationary policies, we find ourselves in a genuine housing crisis. We just have to look at the facts to see how broken housing is here in Canada. The motion we are debating today clearly lays out how desperate housing has become under the Liberal government’s leadership. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in the 10 biggest cities has almost doubled since it has taken office. Monthly mortgage costs have also doubled in that time. The cost of owning a home is, on average, 60% of a person’s income, making home ownership out of reach for even more Canadians. In fact, nine out of 10 young Canadians have given up on the dream of home ownership entirely.
With inflation soaring at a 40-year high, it is cutting into the paycheques of Canadians, driving up costs and limiting purchasing power. Let us not forget the Liberal government’s inflationary carbon tax, which is also driving up the cost on everything and constraining household budgets. Of course, the government's deficits are driving up mortgage rates. With higher interest rates, many families are struggling to make their mortgage payments. The current reality is that, under the Liberal government’s leadership, rent has become ever more unaffordable and home ownership ever less attainable.
The critical need for housing exists across the continuum of housing. Because this shortage exists in every stage of housing, there are Canadians living in housing that is not suitable to their circumstances, but they are unable to transition. Supply is simply not meeting demand, and existing programs have not closed the gap.
When it comes to chronic homelessness, the Auditor General’s report from last fall portrayed a very bleak assessment of the effectiveness of the Liberal government’s policies and leadership on the housing file. The Auditor General found that CMHC could not determine whether or not its programs were improving housing outcomes for vulnerable Canadians and preventing chronic homelessness. The reason for that was it did not know who was benefiting from the initiatives.
In that same AG report we found that Infrastructure Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada could not assess the success of their programs either. These departments were not using up-to-date data on homelessness to assess their effectiveness. The report makes clear there is minimal federal accountability on the goals set out by the Liberal government in its national housing strategy, and it is not clear who the lead is on these files. ESDC and CMHC are not coordinated, and the disconnect between these two entities is a recipe for failure.
We know the Liberal government loves a good photo op and a big announcement. Of course, big targets and ambitious goals sound great, but all the targets in the world will not achieve results without a plan and real leadership as a driving force to bring them home. The Parliamentary Budget Officer reported that six of the main national housing strategy programs have barely spent 50% of their budgeted amount. If the funding envelope exists but is not being utilized, that gap points to a problem in the structure and delivery of these programs. We hear about how long it takes for applications to be processed. A lengthy processing time can negatively impact the viability of a project. Inflation is soaring, costs are going up, taxes are going up and labour is limited.
All of those factors have a direct impact on project costs and their timelines. When we delay getting shovels in the ground, costs go up and, at some point, projects are no longer viable.
We also often hear about unnecessary red tape and the bureaucratic hoops that are required to access CMHC programs. There is certainly a red tape problem when applicants need to hire high-priced consultants to successfully navigate the application process, and that is an issue. It means smaller communities and community groups are at a major disadvantage because they do not have the resources needed to navigate the bureaucracy that is CMHC. In practice, this is yet another obstacle in increasing the supply of housing in Canada. The lack of housing supply is driving up prices and directly contributing to the lack of affordable housing options.
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has said that Canada needs 5.8 million new homes by 2030 to restore affordability. To build those new homes, we need to have skilled tradespeople to do the work. Unfortunately, there are significant labour shortages across industries and sectors. Whether it is health care workers, child care workers or tradespeople, workforce shortages are a recurring priority that comes up in just about every single meeting that I have in my office.
With the shortage of skilled tradespeople, the construction industry is not immune. A targeted workforce strategy that has immediate and also long-term solutions is critical. There needs to be a comprehensive plan in place to ensure we have the necessary skilled tradespeople to build new houses. That strategy should include a plan to work with provinces to ensure that our federal immigration system is attracting immigrants with skills in the trades. However, it also needs to include a plan to work with the provinces to speed up the credential recognition process so they can fill those immediate needs in our economy and relocate as needed.
Every level of government has a role to play in addressing the current housing crisis in our country. Certainly, all levels of government need to work in co-operation to achieve meaningful results. That requires strong leadership at the federal level. It is time for a federal government that is less focused on announcements and more focused on results. We need to remove government gatekeepers who are blocking home building.
Municipal governments are on the front lines of housing and have direct impact on the construction of new homes. The federal government can help remove municipal gatekeepers by creating greater incentives for municipalities to build houses.
The federal government is providing billions of dollars annually to municipal governments. Those federal infrastructure dollars should mean a result of the new construction of homes. A system that rewards construction and disincentivizes delays will ensure progress.
The federal government also has thousands of buildings that are being underutilized, buildings that could be better used to meet today’s housing demands. The Conservatives have proposed selling off 15% of underutilized federal buildings to increase the supply of affordable housing. These Conservative solutions will help make real progress and close the gap between the growing demand and the shortage in supply.
As the housing crisis grows, we need to see focused and effective leadership at the federal level. The housing minister is always quick to stand in the House and talk about the Liberals' big announcements, but the facts speak for themselves. The demand for housing is growing and the supply is not keeping pace. Rent and mortgages are becoming more and more expensive and the Liberal government has failed to deliver efficient and effective programs.
The Conservatives have a plan. We have proposed practical solutions to address the growing housing crisis. It is time for effective federal leadership that will remove gatekeepers and cut unnecessary red tape so we can get houses built.
Mr. Speaker, I find it somewhat interesting how the Conservatives have brought forward a motion today that, for the most part, the government is already doing. It is almost as if the Conservatives are looking for some policy ideas, reviewing what is happening and is now trying to amplify them.
I wonder if the member can give a clear indication of something that is truly unique, something the Conservatives are saying that is not a bumper sticker saying.
Mr. Speaker, when the Conservatives were in government, nine out of 10 young Canadians did not give up on the dream of home ownership.
CMHC has come plenty of times to the committee on which I sit. The data is not being collected. If the member listened to my speech, I asked who was in charge. Is it ESDC or CMHC? There is no federal leadership from the government.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, my colleague dwelt at length on how difficult it is for small municipalities and organizations to deal with red tape so they can access various housing funding programs.
Today's motion adds more conditions for gaining access to these programs in order to get the necessary funding to move forward with plans that are already on the starting line and just need money to get going.
How can the Conservatives say that there is too much red tape and then impose conditions that create even more red tape? Would it not be better to give the municipalities and the provinces free rein in their own jurisdiction and release the money?
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I have been listening throughout today's debate and it seems like the Bloc wants to be dependent on Ottawa. What the Conservatives have proposed is to empower municipalities and the provinces. This would give them the opportunity to just get it done. The Conservatives will stop the privileged gatekeepers who are preventing houses from being built and empower municipalities and provinces to get it done, so Canadians have a place to call home.
Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy hearing the member speak, but we cannot neglect the deplorable Harper regime record where we lost over 300,000 affordable housing units. These were units to which seniors, people with disabilities, families and youth all had access.
The Conservatives today have presented a motion that would not give one blue cent to housing, and they have just rejected the NDP amendment that would ensure there would be a role for co-operative housing, social housing and community housing.
My question for my colleague is simply this. Is this just the performative arts by the Conservatives, that they are not actually seeking to find the solutions and to put in place the funding that is so critical to ensure that every Canadian has a roof over his or her head at night?
Mr. Speaker, there is something fundamentally different between me and my colleague: I do not believe that government has all the answers. I do not want Canadians to feel that they have to knock on the door of whatever elected official at whatever government level to answer, help and give them what they need. Canadians are resilient and they are strong. We need to cut the bureaucratic red tape that is preventing Canadians from achieving their dream.
Mr. Speaker, I posed a question in the chamber earlier, and it has been talked about. The government likes to throw a lot of money at programs, but it does not measure outcomes. As I have said already, when I asked the Minister of Northern Affairs, he said that the department did not follow incomes; it did not track the data.
However, the member knows all too well that the NDP could do a great thing and bring down the government at the earliest opportunity to see a good government take over. What can the NDP do to really cause positive change in Canada today?
Mr. Speaker, frankly, the NDP could have some principle and a backbone, withdraw from its confidence-and-supply agreement and stand up for the Canadians who elected those members as opposition to the House.
Mr. Speaker, since the government came into power, the cost of housing has doubled. Nine out of 10 young Canadians believe they will never have home ownership. Families from coast to coast to coast cannot even afford the interest on their mortgages. Numerous rankings regularly list Vancouver and Toronto as among the most unaffordable cities in the world. To put that into context, they are worse than those notorious for their high cost of living like New York. Perhaps the most illustrative comparison is that with our neighbour down south.
The United States has just shy of 332 million people living on 9.8 million square kilometres. In contrast, Canada has 38 million people living on 10 million square kilometres. In no world does it make sense that housing should cost twice as much here than in the U.S. despite its density being nearly 10 times our own.
The simple reality is that the government's mismanagement coupled with local NIMBY gatekeepers block development and drive up mortgages and housing costs. This is the only explanation of the fact that we have the fewest homes in the G7 per capita despite having the most space.
The Prime Minister has enabled municipalities that block development and rob our future generations of a chance of home ownership. A Conservative government would put an end to that. We would remove the bureaucratic gatekeepers from the equation, free up land and speed up the accreditation and permit process to get more shovels in the ground as soon as possible. This is a dire necessity that needed action yesterday, not tomorrow.
In eastern Ontario, a recent report stated that our region needed to build upward of 14,000 rental units just to meet demand. This does not include any actual growth, but solely takes into account what we need to build to meet the demand. This is ludicrous and a direct result of the failure of governments at all levels that acquiesce to activists.
This crisis is not just limited to housing. Just last week, I received an email from the Food Sharing Project, which serves Hastings—Lennox and Addington and the Kingston area by providing food and equipment to schools. It said:
The 2022-2023 school year has been unprecedented for The Food Sharing Project. Due to increasing demand and the skyrocketing costs of food, we are facing a significant budget shortfall as we are now sending out over $25,000 in food every week. We need your help to ensure that students do not go through the school day hungry.
This is the reality of the Prime Minister's Canada: kids who cannot eat and parents who cannot afford shelter.
Inflation is at a 40-year high. Canadians are sacrificing on food for shelter. Mortgages have doubled since 2015, averaging approximately $3,000 a month. Mortgage interest costs rocketed up to 26% in March alone. Red tape is costing an additional $200,000 on new homes. Average rent has nearly doubled for a two-bedroom apartment since 2015, increasing to $2,200 from $1,171 a month. Our youth have lost their dream of home ownership.
The current housing crisis is affecting every single riding across Canada. Each and every one of us in the House is elected to this place to represent our constituents. We have all been contacted by our constituents. On this side of the House, we have a plan to fix the housing crisis, with six simple solutions for Canada.
Canada's Conservatives would require large urban centres where the cost of living is particularly egregious, like Vancouver, to substantially increase home building in their borders. Those that cannot comply would face penalties in the vein of withheld federal funds. This is completely in line with existing legislation regarding provincial governments under the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act.
We would crack down on everyone's most annoying neighbours, the NIMBYs. We would implement a system for residents to raise concerns about the pedantic obstructionism. Should the decision body decide the complaint is well founded, we would supply infrastructure dollars to get those housing units built. In short, we would out-NIMBY the NIMBYs.
We would incentivize municipalities to increase their housing capacities by rewarding those that take the necessary steps to build homes in the form of a building bonus. This would give the latitude to municipalities to decide how to best address their individual needs instead of a cookie-cutter approach, which so often fails in a nation as large and diverse as Canada.
Further, we would require any municipality that seeks federal funds to pre-approve high-density and employment applications on available lands surrounding areas such as bus and subway stops. This would allow common sense residential zones to be built around accessible, walkable areas so residents will not need to choose between living downtown so they can walk to work and living in the suburbs but requiring a car. This is good policy, not only for the pocketbook, but also for the environment.
We would take advantage of the recent remote work paradigm by selling off 15% of federal buildings and have them turned into affordable housing. These buildings are generally already located in urban centres and are already built. The only construction would be converting them and rezoning them to be residential. We expect this would result in 5,500 new residential buildings capable of housing dozens, if not hundreds, of units each.
However, perhaps most importantly, we would stop printing money. Taking inspiration from the Harper era's one-for-one rule regarding red tape, we will require every dollar that we spend to be matched by a dollar saved. This would end the constant cycle of inflationary bubbles caused by out-of-touch central bankers who, on occasion, have helped created the current housing and market crisis.
I would also like to take a moment to address a somewhat different housing crisis affecting some Canadians, our armed forces. The federal government recently implemented changes to the post living differential. This is essentially a top-up for CAF members based on where they live. The government rightly sought to update the formula to better address the current economic climate of the posting areas, as the initial computation was done years ago.
While the formula was due for an update, the government completely revamped the benefit in a manner that has massive financial implications for longer-serving members. They get penalized for being promoted, changing bases, being married to CAF members and succeeding. They are, quite literally, being more penalized the longer they serve. This is having massive consequences for troop morale in a time when retention is quite literally an institutional crisis that cannot be understated. This will add to the already ongoing dearth of long-serving members, as they are looking to transition out of the armed forces. This is unacceptable, and it needs to be addressed. Those men and women who are serving, or who are thinking of serving, should know that a Conservative government would have their backs.
Canada's Conservatives will build and bring it home.
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the member could tell us why, when the government, in an attempt to help Canadians, brought forward the housing support program, the one-time payment, which ultimately helped over half a million Canadian renters, the Conservatives voted against it.
I look at the resolution today, and it seems to be more about trying to convince Canadians that the Conservatives genuinely care about housing. The member spoke of “taking inspiration from the Harper era”, which did nothing for housing. That was the reality of it. Harper did nothing to expand Canada's housing market.
I wonder if the member could provide her thoughts on those two points.
Mr. Speaker, with all due respect, in the Harper years, there was half the rent, half the mortgage and half the down payment to pay. Right now, we have a costly coalition that is continuously making it more difficult for Canadians. Houses are built of beams. Right now, the government is cancelling any dreams of home ownership.
The member opposite is suggesting that the Harper government was not putting Canadians ahead. The numbers talk. Facts talk. The continuous lacklustre announcements from the government are failing Canadians, and Canadians have caught on.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, my question is going to be simple.
With all of the solutions it is proposing, I think the Conservative Party motion is suggesting that we keep doing things that are not working. It is not a question of construction. Housing is being built, but the problem is access to social and affordable housing. That requires specific strategies, not a construction strategy. Construction is happening in both urban and rural areas. These units are offered up to market forces, but the market will never succeed in making housing affordable, because that is not its mission. Meeting long-term needs is not part of its mission either. If we want affordable housing, we need a paradigm shift. We need to redirect that money out of the market.
Does my colleague agree with this analysis?
[English]
Mr. Speaker, the paradigm shift that we need in this place is to have people in government who are fighting for the Canada that we once loved.
I got an email from an individual in my riding who is concerned with the price of the variable interest rates. She wrote that she is listing her home because her variable payment has gone from $2,000 to $4,000 a month. She has to sell because she cannot afford it. This is a couple in my riding who saved and saved. They finally got a home that they love. They renovated it beyond their expectations, and now they have to sell it.
This government is failing Canadians, and it needs to step up.
Uqaqtittiji, I would like to ask about affordability, which the member started talking about but did not really discuss in the rest of her intervention.
The NDP feels that there needs to be assurances that projects are meeting the core housing needs of Canadians. Does the member agree that infrastructure funding should be tied to specific affordability criteria?
Mr. Speaker, after serving on a municipal council for 15 years, I completely understand where the member is coming from, but what we need to recognize is that the indication of our housing situation is getting worse. It is not getting better.
The government is extremely crafty at announcements and reannouncing an announcement. It is not working.
Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Vaughan—Woodbridge.
I want to take a bit of a different approach to the issue because people who are following the debate should get a bit of a history and an understanding of why we are where we are today, who is responsible for what, and what the current government has done. I believe that the government, in a real and tangible way, has stepped up to the plate. Let me expand by commenting on what I talked about at the beginning.
When I was first elected to the Manitoba legislature back in 1988, I was appointed as the housing critic for the Province of Manitoba. Therefore, virtually from day one, I have had an interest in housing. With respect to public, subsidized housing, the cost was always somewhere in the range of 25% or closer to 30% of an individual's salary, and they would be subsidized in the tens of thousands of non-profit housing units in the province of Manitoba alone.
With respect to federal contributions, one of the biggest ongoing contributions that Ottawa provides across the country is for non-profit, low-income housing, which is there for people with disabilities, seniors, individuals on fixed incomes and individuals who have low income or virtually no income at all. We tie in literally hundreds of millions of dollars every year, and that is how Ottawa, in essence, has that ongoing support.
I want to go to 1991 or 1992. It was during the Charlottetown accord debate. I was in the north end of Winnipeg, and I was debating Bill Blaikie, an NDP member of Parliament at the time. Bill Blaikie was defending why Ottawa does not have a role in housing and why provinces and municipalities should be responsible for housing. I disagreed with that back in 1991. Every political party supported divesting of Ottawa's authority in housing back in 1991-92. That is why I was not surprised when we saw cutbacks in housing in the following years.
I opposed it then, and I would oppose it today, but the difference today is that we finally have a Prime Minister who understands the important role that Ottawa plays in housing. Therefore, I am hoping that members of all political parties will recognize that, whenever there is a constitutional debate, hopefully sometime in the distant future, never again will we see federal politicians not recognizing the importance of housing to Canadians. It is important that Canada, as a national government, does play a role.
Let us go back over the last number of years since we have replaced the Harper regime. We have seen not only hundreds of millions of dollars but also multiple billions of dollars being invested in a national housing strategy, which includes things that are being proposed by the Conservative Party today in its motion. The Conservatives know that. Do we think they would come up with an original idea? What they are doing, in many ways, is taking some Liberal ideas and amplifying them.
We could talk about the accelerator fund to speed up the construction. In the budget, the Minister of Finance and the government have been very clear that we want to double construction over the next decade over what we are seeing today. The accelerator fund is an investment of billions of dollars to speed up the process while working with municipalities.
I would hope that people who are following the debate today would have an appreciation that there are limitations on what Ottawa can actually do. We can use financial incentives, which we are doing. Like no other government in the history of Canada has ever done, this government has stepped up to provide the financial incentives to see more construction and more homes built in Canada.
However, we are only one of several players. I would argue that our municipalities, both rural and urban, need to come to the table in a larger capacity. The zoning issue, the bureaucracy of red tape in construction, is of critical importance. If anyone wants to try to buy a lot in the city of Winnipeg, I wish them good luck. No one can buy an individual lot. If, by chance, someone might discover something, we are talking about huge amounts of money. Around 1990, I purchased a lot for $30,000 or $32,000. A few years later, the lot prices skyrocketed. Now, people cannot get lots. However, in some of the rural communities in Manitoba, people can find those $30,000 lots.
Let us ask the questions. Why? Where is the money being invested? How can we ensure that housing remains more affordable, that there are larger quantities of space for the building of homes, and that there is more construction? In order to do that, as the seconder of the motion, a former mayor, made reference to, cities must play an absolutely critical role and step up. In our case, we are encouraging that. Provinces also play a critical role. When I was the housing critic at the provincial level in the late 1980s, infill housing was really important. We needed to look at ways to build homes on vacant lots, particularly in areas that were in need.
Housing co-ops are another form of housing that Canadians could truly benefit from. There is a difference between a housing co-op and an apartment block. I like to say that people in an apartment block are tenants, and that, in a housing co-op, they are residents. There is a big difference. Being in a housing co-op is similar to being a condo owner of sorts. There are opportunities for us to be able to expand. That is why, when the Minister of Housing indicated that we wanted to see the expansion and supported that expansion of housing co-ops, I saw that as a good thing.
There are organizations, third parties out there, that have done phenomenal work. I am thinking in particular about Habitat for Humanity in the city of Winnipeg and in the province of Manitoba. Habitat for Humanity has built 500 new houses over the years. One of the biggest benefactors has been the community of Winnipeg North, whether it is in The Maples, the traditional north end, Point Douglas, or all over Winnipeg North. Habitat has been there to support people who would otherwise not have had the opportunity, in all likelihood, to become home owners. Habitat is not unique to the province of Manitoba; it is across Canada. The federal government has supported that.
The federal government continues to work with willing provinces wherever it can. The point I am trying to emphasize is that the federal government, like no other government in the history of Canada, with the possible exception of when the World War II war homes were being built, has come to the plate and has been there in a very real and tangible way, with more than just dollars. Our commitment to support Canadians and the housing industry is second to no other in the history of Canada. We do want, and we are prepared to continue, to work with the stakeholders, whether those are private, non-profit, provincial governments, territorial governments or indigenous governments.
The former Kapyong Barracks is a wonderful parcel of land that is being developed today. It was formerly federal lands. There is so much more to say, but I will leave it at that.
Mr. Speaker, one of the troubling aspects of the motion I am looking at is that there is talk about the free market just taking care of itself and getting out of the way. Meanwhile, the Conservatives want to use government, through a motion in the House of Commons, to actually tell the market what to do. Where I struggle with this motion is that, in the past in Windsor West, when we had a high unemployment rate, we were recruited by the military to serve in Afghanistan and in other types of overseas operations because of our high unemployment. There were billboards and a series of other things. Then the government at the time, under Harper, closed my veterans office, so when we had returning soldiers coming back with mental illness, stress and a whole series of issues, we did not have supports there anymore. We actually had people having to go to London, Ontario, 200 kilometres away, even to get counselling.
My question for the member is this. When we have government policy dictating that our citizens must take extreme types of measures for all of us, is there not a role and responsibility for the House to also make things right at the end of the day?
Mr. Speaker, that was an interesting question. The office closures mentioned by the member actually happened in Brandon, Manitoba as well. I think there were nine veterans offices that were closed down coast to coast to coast. I know that my colleagues in Atlantic Canada remember this quite well because of the impact it had there.
What I find interesting is the statement that the current leader of the Conservative Party made when I posed a question to him regarding the investments we put into housing. In essence, his response was that we would have been better off not to have spent the money. I believe that the Conservative Party, if ever given the opportunity, would cut back all expenditures in regard to national housing. Even the member who spoke before me said we should take inspiration from Stephen Harper. The leader of the Conservative Party was one of his ministers. He is a former minister of housing, who took inspiration from Harper, who did absolutely nothing, zero, on housing. Now we have the leader of the Conservative Party saying we do not need to provide money. It should concern all of us.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, so far this morning, all I have heard is people saying it is not their fault, it is someone else's. That is what we are seeing in the House of Commons in terms of this motion.
On the one side, the Liberal Party says it is doing a lot for Canadians, but it is not actually doing much. On the other side, the Conservatives dive straight into meddling, taking a page out of the NDP-Liberal coalition's playbook.
What is affordable housing? How can we really help people who need it?
I have been here all morning, and I have not heard anything about that. There have been no answers to these questions.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I indicated a number of things in my comments as to how we could improve our current conditions, but it involves bringing all the different players to the table. The primary difference between, let us say, myself and the Bloc, or the government and the Bloc, is that the Bloc believes that Ottawa is nothing more than a cash ATM machine, with the answer being we should just give the provinces the money and let the provinces do everything. That goes against what I believe Canadians from coast to coast to coast expect of the national government. That has been clearly demonstrated by a lot of the discussions that have been taking place today in the House. The national government does have a role, a responsibility to ensure that there is housing for Canadians, no matter where they live, and to put in the resources, supports and encouragement wherever possible.
Mr. Speaker, there have been a lot of speeches from the other side of the House today that have been trying to rewrite history. I was a municipal councillor during the years Harper was in government and, as the member pointed out, there were no programs for municipalities. There were no housing programs for not-for-profits. I wonder if the hon. member could reiterate parts of his speech that talked about policy support, the national housing strategy and what that means for not-for-profits and housing providers across the country, versus what we experienced during the Harper years.
Mr. Speaker, the Conservative Party actually captured the answer to that today, in terms of the contrast. One member spoke of taking inspiration from the Harper era. The member who is a former councillor understands that the former era had absolutely nothing, zero, for housing. Then, the leader of the Conservative Party, today in the House, in his introduction, said that money is not the issue. He feels that we should not have invested hundreds of millions, going into billions, of dollars. I think that is the contrast.
Mr. Speaker, it is great to rise any day in the honourable House to see my esteemed colleagues debate a very important topic for our constituents from coast to coast to coast.
Before I get into my formal remarks, I first want to thank those Canadians who are out there today, in the communities we all call home, building the homes that newcomers and Canadians who are purchasing their first home will move into, whether they are in the mid-rise, low-rise or high-rise categories of the housing sector, and whether they are in Ontario, B.C., or out on the east coast. I want to thank all of the union members from my riding's own LiUNA Local 183. Its training facility and future headquarters will open in a few months. I also want to thank the carpenters' union Local 27, the individuals who build the homes, and those in the subtrades, such as electricians, the people who do the forming, and the roofers. I wish to thank all of the folks who participate in building homes across Canada for what they do day in and day out. Whether it is raining, cold, snowing or hot, they are there doing that great work.
The housing builders and developers, many of whom reside in the city of Vaughan and are good friends, do a phenomenal job building homes for Canadians. They take risks, and they have done it for decades. Some of these developers and builders came to Canada as immigrants, especially those in the Italian Canadian community. For the last 50 or 60 years, they have built literally thousands of homes for Canadians. It is great to see the next generation, their kids, taking over their businesses and continuing that entrepreneurial spirit that personifies the country that my parents, who now get to call Canada home, came from.
[Translation]
I am pleased to have this opportunity to talk about an issue that really matters to me: housing affordability for Canadians.
Everyone in Canada deserves to have a safe, affordable home, but we know that is getting harder and harder for Canadian families across the country. Housing is a key socio-economic determinant essential to building communities, supporting our families and creating opportunities for young people.
In the wake of the pandemic, we are experiencing a period of high inflation and rising interest rates. Canadians are extremely concerned about the housing crisis and are getting more and more worried.
The Canadian housing system is complex, with many factors contributing to significant and ongoing price increases. We know one of the main reasons for the crisis is that housing supply is not keeping up with demand and has not been for years. Canada's population is growing faster than that of any other G7 country, but our housing supply has not been able to keep up with demand.
[English]
Supply and demand are out of balance.
[Translation]
There is no simple solution. However, in the medium and long term, a big part of the solution lies on the supply side. In other words, to make housing more affordable, we need to build more housing. That is what our government is doing with the national housing strategy, which includes many supply-side programs supported by more than $82 billion over 10 years.
The strategy was developed before the pandemic. That is why the 2022 federal budget, which focused on housing, introduced new tools to address the new housing reality and the new challenges in the wake of the pandemic.
In budget 2022 we made new investments to expand existing programs. Steps were also taken to accelerate the rollout of certain programs. We have also introduced new initiatives to tackle the issue of housing affordability from all angles. More recently, the government proposed new measures in budget 2023 to continue these efforts.
I would like to use my time today to talk about a new initiative that will be launched this summer, the housing accelerator fund. This $4-billion fund will provide money to local governments to encourage them to improve their housing approval and construction processes. This will make it possible to build more housing faster.
Our government has had discussions with mayors and local leaders across the country. They told us that they face obstacles that they still do not have the financial capacity to overcome. Whether it is housing-related infrastructure, outdated permitting systems, the introduction of inclusive zoning or the promotion of public transit-oriented housing projects, the obstacles they face are real.
Projects to create new housing are often delayed at the municipal level. That is a very significant problem. For that reason, our government worked with all levels of government and the housing sector to find a real solution. The housing accelerator fund will help local governments resolve these problems by supporting measures to reduce red tape, delays and other obstacles to the construction of new housing. The fund will help expedite the supply of housing across Canada. We anticipate the creation of 100,000 net new housing units by the time the initiative ends in 2026-27.
Even better, the positive impact of the measures being put in place will be felt for many years to come. Because we are investing in systemic changes, the impact of the activities that this fund will support will be felt beyond the duration of the fund itself. These activities will continue to promote the construction of more new housing, including affordable housing, in the long term.
The goal is not just to build more housing. This new initiative seeks to build a more effective housing system. It will encourage the creation of inclusive and equitable communities that are resilient to climate change and favour diversity.
A lot of work has been done across the country since we launched the national housing strategy in 2017. Our government's investments are making a difference. They are creating much‑needed housing and giving vulnerable people the support they need to remain housed and build a better future for themselves. Through the housing accelerator fund, our government is pleased to expand these efforts even further. By investing in promoting affordable housing, the government is contributing to establishing stronger communities, creating jobs and growing the middle class, all while aiming to end chronic homelessness and offering help to the most vulnerable among us.
There is still a lot more work to be done to make housing more affordable in Canada, and we cannot do it alone. That is why we plan to continue working with our partners, meaning the provinces, territories, municipalities, indigenous communities, non-profit organizations and the private sector, to build the housing that Canadians need. By working together, we can ensure that everyone in Canada has a safe, affordable home.
In conclusion, I hope my remarks have helped make the circumstances surrounding this new initiative and its general parameters clearer for everyone. More details about the housing accelerator fund are available on the CMHC website.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague the following question.
These assumptions will sound somewhat farfetched, but let us say that the Liberal government is sincere about its objective of providing affordable housing as part of a real housing strategy. That is the first assumption. The second has to do with the single page we keep mentioning, the one tiny page in the budget that deals with a real housing strategy. Let us say that the Liberals really want to do something with that.
Will they walk the talk? How is it that the Liberal government's biggest investments in housing are never spent? We do not know. The reasons are unclear. Can our colleague finally enlighten us on this serious issue? In the end, the money never gets spent.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her very important question.
[English]
We need to build houses and get them completed.
What I will say to the hon. member's question is that the $4-billion accelerator fund will help municipalities. Municipalities can submit their applications now. One can go to the CMHC website, I believe. It is from coast to coast to coast, to help them put in place the infrastructure so that we can build housing faster here in Canada and meet the needs that Canadians have for housing, whether it is a condo, townhouse or detached house, here in this beautiful country.
Uqaqtittiji, the Liberal government has been, for years, saying that there is no relationship more important than that with the first nations, Métis and Inuit. The member talked about how much more work they still need to do regarding housing, including indigenous housing, showing how indigenous peoples are at the bottom of the priority list.
Can the member explain why it is that the government chose to make sure that indigenous housing does not start until 2024 and is spread out wide over Canada when there are so many indigenous peoples that are in dire need of homes?
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is correct. There is no more important relationship for the government than a nation-to-nation relationship.
With regard to the specific question on housing for indigenous communities, in the budget there is a $4-billion commitment for rural and northern communities and indigenous communities, for housing. We have much work to do.
I think that everyone can acknowledge that and we will continue the good work that we have started since 2015, in partnering on a nation-to-nation basis.
Mr. Speaker, as a former Hamilton councillor, I know that my former colleagues and municipal staff are doing everything they can to increase housing supply, as well as provide support for affordable housing.
What I do not understand is the motion that has been put today by members on the opposite side of the House, which seeks to blame their former municipalities or the municipalities where they are from and the municipalities that they represented.
The member opposite was from Centre Hastings, a former municipal councillor who is blaming her municipal staff for standing in the way, the gatekeepers, in terms of preventing supply and affordable investment.
We have heard from the former mayor of Collingwood, whose motion here today speaks to that same issue, in terms of blaming municipalities.
I wonder if my colleague sees fit, in terms of supporting municipalities, and sees how our national housing strategy is providing support to municipalities instead of laying blame at their feet.
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek has become a great friend and he is a great addition to our team and our caucus. He is very knowledgeable on how we build more housing by working with all levels of government.
That is one facet of our government since we have come into power in 2015. It has been our collaboration with the provincial government, with the regional government, where that pertains, with working with cities. They have had no better friend than this government for the last several years. They will have no better friend going forward, as we move toward building more housing for Canadians, providing them the services they need and making sure that every Canadian can live in the community they like and can move into that home, so that they can create that future and those memories that we all do here as parliamentarians when we go back to see our loved ones.
Mr. Speaker, I am going to split my time with my friend and colleague, the member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord.
I want to take a step back, because I think this debate is about much more than housing.
The central promise of Canada has always been that it does not matter where a person has been but rather where a person is going, and it does not matter who a person is but what a person can do, and that a person can be better off than the people who came before them if they worked hard and dreamt big. This is the reason millions of immigrants have chosen to come to our nation's shore from places all around the world. It is the reason Canada is a place of inspiration for people from all over the globe. It is the reason our young people have always looked ahead to a future of hope instead of fear. They knew that Canada was a place of endless opportunity where the only limit on a person's success was how high they could set their aspirations.
That was certainly true for my own parents who came here from the Soviet Union in the 1970s and worked hard for a better life for their children. It is a testament to the power of our country that, in one generation, someone like me from my family can go from a front seat of a taxi to the front row of Parliament.
Young people, immigrants, people from all walks of life are doing exactly the same thing today. Their work ethic, passion and drive remain the same, but something has changed. Despite doing everything right, despite doing everything we have asked of them, saving money, going to school, getting a job, they are falling further and further behind, and that dream is slipping away. All we have to do is go back to any one of the 338 ridings represented by members of Parliament in this place to know that is true.
When the promise of a better life, new opportunities and bright horizons is no longer a guarantee, then something is broken in Canada, and now everybody knows it. There are many reasons why Conservatives and people from all over the country feel that way: from our broken ethics laws from the other side, to our bail system, to our eye-popping national debt. However, the embarrassing failure of this government to act to ensure housing affordability and availability for Canadians is one of the biggest failures of this generation.
To afford the average home in Toronto, a person needs to make over $207,000 a year. However, the median income in Toronto is not that. It means that home ownership is nearly impossible for anybody to attain, not to mention recently arrived immigrants who cannot work in their professions because of government gatekeeping and red tape, students working part-time trying to complete their studies or single parents just trying to make ends meet. For the lucky few who can afford a down payment on a home, the people who thought they would make it out of the woods, well, they are no better off either, because all across the country interest rate hikes caused by this Prime Minister's reckless spending are sending mortgage bills through the roof.
In 2015, when the Liberals first formed government, the average monthly mortgage payment in Canada was $1,268. After eight years, it is nearly $3,000. It has more than doubled, but our wages and our productivity have stagnated.
The Royal Bank now estimates that 62.7% of household income is needed to cover home ownership costs. That is the worst on record. It is unattainable. What does that mean? Well, we only need to look around to see that 1.5 million Canadians are at a food bank in a single month in this country. People are cutting back and skipping meals, because they need to save more money just to keep their homes. There is unprecedented financial anxiety and strain. In fact, 45% of variable mortgage rate holders have already said that they would have to sell their homes in nine months or less. That is not to mention, of course, nine out of 10 young Canadians who do not believe that they will ever own a home in this country.
I was always told that if I could not afford a home, I should rent a property until I could afford to buy something on my own. I am sure many people were told the same thing. However, even rentals are out of reach. In just one year, the average rent in Canada's three largest cities went up by 20% and, on average, grew by 10%.
In 2015, a one-bedroom apartment in Toronto cost just over $1,100. It is now over $2,300. It has more than double. The Liberals have doubled housing prices, doubled mortgage payments and doubled the cost of rent. If people cannot afford to buy a home, if they cannot afford to pay rent or do anything else, what the hell are they supposed to do? Where are they going to live?
The Liberals say that they care. They want to talk about their famous quote “the middle class and those working hard to join it”, but we have to ask if these are the results of a government that is looking out for people in need. Who is benefiting from the cost of living crisis? Is it ordinary people who cannot even find a place to live or is it those who already have properties, investments and assets in our biggest cities? This is Canada. It is a G7 country. This is unacceptable and everybody here should agree.
Is this really the best we can do? That is the question for this debate. The Liberals say yes. They say that Canadians should be grateful, that Canadians have never had it so good. They say that making do with less, like cancelling a Disney+ subscription or cutting back a little, is the only thing they have to do to solve all their problems, and thank goodness they are here taking care of Canadians. The problem is that Canadians who are facing the crisis do not exactly agree. In fact, many of them do not agree. It will soon be a majority of them who do not agree.
The Conservatives say no. We understand that people across the country understand this too, because it is obvious now. The jig is up. Things are not okay in our country and it is time we did better. We can do more to help families achieve the dream of home ownership. We can do more to help young people achieve the dream of home ownership. We can do more to help new Canadians, students and people with lower incomes get by. We can do more to make Canada once again a place where there is hope for the future, where people are optimistic that they will do better than the generation that came before them.
How do we do that? We do that by fixing what the Liberals broke. We do that by removing the big-city gatekeepers, the bureaucrats and those who are keeping housing from being developed. They are keeping Canadians away from their dream of home ownership. We do it by using the power of the federal government, not to obstruct but to empower. We need to empower and incentivize municipalities to build better places for people to live, like high-density housing near transit so they can take the train or bus to work or school.
In British Columbia, people can get a permit to sell cocaine faster than they can get a permit to build a home. That is the reality in Canada today and that is shameful.
We do this by also supporting towns and cities that actually get things done, not those who talk, or study, or plan like the government does right now or make Instagram announcements of more money. In fact, the government has spent the most money to fail, and failed expensively.
This is for those who actually put shovels in the ground and build for the next generation. We do that by doing our part too, by selling the underutilized government buildings that can be turned into affordable housing. The Liberals even agree with this, because a resolution at their upcoming policy convention this week says that they should sell 30% of its building and turn them into housing. Even their supporters get it. Their most die-hard supporters have put that idea forward. When will the Liberals listen?
We do it by addressing the other issues that impact housing affordability, like the cost of essentials such as the cost of gas, groceries and home heating. They have all gone up under the government. We do it by working to bring back well-paying jobs to Canada, by making a government that actually works. In today’s Canada, it often feels like hope is lost, like our best days are behind us.
We know the Liberals do not have a plan. We know that the Prime Minister has spent more money to achieve less than all of his predecessors combined. It is even worse. The Liberals tell us just to accept it as it is.
We do know better is possible. That is the Liberal slogan, but it will be our action. We know that Canadians are strong, we know that they are resilient and we know that this is the best country on earth. It is time for a government that also knows that too. It is time for a Conservative government and Canadians will be better for it.
Mr. Speaker, I know the member opposite represents another community in York Region not far from me. Why are the Conservatives putting forward something that talks about municipalities and regions needing us to tell them what to do?
We have been working with regions and municipalities through a number of different initiatives to help them and to provide incentives. The member refers to gatekeepers. Are those the fire codes, the environmental regulations or the need for proper water and sewage? What is the member talking about when she talks about removing these gatekeepers? I feel that our municipalities and regions are doing a good job. They know their communities best.
Mr. Speaker, the member opposite lives in a community that looks a lot like mine, and I am sure she hears from young people who will never afford to live where they actually grew up. Under the government, rents have doubled, mortgages have doubled and the price of a house has doubled, and it has not incentivized municipalities to build the density that is needed for young people to afford a home.
I am not sure how the member can defend that to her constituents, to York Region or, frankly, to the benches of her own government.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, the current housing situation is typical of the government's management in recent decades.
First, the federal government lets a situation completely deteriorate. Second, it places the blame on Quebec, the Canadian provinces and the municipalities. Third, the federal government imposes conditions on the use of the money that comes from those same provinces and municipalities in order to play the hero in a situation of its own making. Today's Conservative motion is just one example of this. How is the Conservative-Liberal-NDP coalition going?
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I am not sure what coalition the member is talking about, but the opposition has put forward this motion because we hear from constituents and Canadians right across the board that housing has become out of reach, that the dream of home ownership has become out of reach, that nine out of 10 young Canadians do not believe they will ever own a home. If people looked at the 2023 budget, the one that was just deposed by the Minister of Finance, they would not know if the government is even concerned about building a single house in our country.
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the member could clarify how she defines “affordable housing”. We have all seen the ways in which affordable housing has been poorly defined, by defining housing that is nowhere near affordable in the past. Also, has she consulted with local organizations like the Federation of Canadian Municipalities on the issues they are defining as NIMBY-ism as well as zoning development as found in this motion?
Mr. Speaker, I actually agree with the member opposite on her concern about affordable housing, but we do not have any affordable housing in our country. We do not have enough housing for the population that is becoming new Canadians, the 500,000 people a year who will come into this country and have nowhere to live. We are building four for every 10 people coming in.
I am happy to let her know that I will be speaking at the Federation of Canadian Municipalities later this month. I consistently consult with it on its ideas, and many of those ideas are found within this motion.
Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Thornhill talked about the evaporation of the dream of home ownership for so many young people, but I have talked to businesspeople. One of their challenges is getting workers, and that is tied to the lack of available housing close to where the jobs are. This goes right to the very heart of our economy.
Could the member comment on that?
Mr. Speaker, the member opposite brings up a good point. The government has talked a lot about a housing accelerator fund. One of the biggest criticisms of that fund is that it is not actually building housing, as one cannot live in an accelerator. However, small cities do not have the manpower to staff and develop the plan. Again, that is another Instagram announcement from the government with absolutely no follow through.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to discuss the motion we are moving today to call on the government to make renting more affordable and make access to first-time home ownership easier. This is something that the government does not seem to be too concerned about. Who pays the price at the end of the day? It is Canadians yet again.
After eight years of this Prime Minister, things are not looking very rosy for Canada. We are experiencing the worst inflation in 40 years. Grocery prices are spiking, and so is the cost of housing and homes. Canadians are struggling to make ends meet. They have to choose between food, clothing and shelter. Workers are bringing home a paycheque that is worth less because everything goes to taxes. With the little that is left, they have to pay for groceries that keep going up in price. They have to pay for their car, and gas prices keep climbing. They have to pay for clothing and housing as well. It should come as no surprise that people are at the end of their rope.
I want to remind the House what constitute basic needs: food, clothing and shelter. Having a roof over one's head should not be a luxury. It is a basic and fundamental need. In an industrialized country like ours, no one should have to worry about not having access to affordable housing or a home. It is unacceptable and inconceivable that people have to sleep in their parents' basement because they have no money.
We are talking about hard-working, dedicated people who have done everything they have been told to do, but still find themselves having to live with their parents because mortgages and housing prices have skyrocketed under this Prime Minister. In fact, mortgage and rent prices have doubled since this Prime Minister has been in office.
When the Liberals took office, the average monthly payment for a new home was $1,400. Today, it is over $3,000. Renting is no better. In 2015, the average rent in Canada for a one-bedroom apartment was $973. Today, the average price is $1,760. Finding a place to live in Canada has become very difficult for both renters and owners.
Canadians can simply no longer afford to keep this Prime Minister with his inflationary spending in office. The Prime Minister does not like taking responsibility. We have seen that in the past. This is not the first time he has blamed everyone else for his incompetence and bad policies, as well as his bad decisions. Sometimes we wonder what the Prime Minister's real role is because, to hear him speak, he controls very little in this country.
That is the case with the current housing crisis. He blames the rising rents on a global phenomenon, but it is not true. Statistics show the opposite. The vast majority of countries do not have a housing crisis like we do in Canada. The average house in Canada now costs twice as much as in the United States. How can that be? Despite having a population 10 times that of Canada and less land, the United States does not have the same housing crisis as Canada.
Let us compare Toronto and Vancouver. We have always known that rent is expensive in those two major cities. That is not new, except that the situation is going from bad to worse. In a new ranking of the most unaffordable cities in the world, Vancouver is third and Toronto is 10th. New York and London are ranked lower. That is incredible.
Once again, the Liberals refuse to take responsibility for the current housing crisis in Canada. We are in a real crisis. Nine out of 10 Canadians have given up on the idea of buying their first home. We are talking about an entire generation that cannot imagine being able to buy a home to raise a family, all because of this government's inflationary spending and taxing.
Years of bad policies have left us with a housing shortage. We have land to build housing, but it is taking too long to get the buildings built. The Liberals have pumped billions of dollars in federal subsidies into the big cities, but this has not resulted in more new builds or enough affordable housing. It appears to be a pattern with these Liberals. They turn on the money tap, but nothing gets any better. In fact, the financial situation of Canadians is getting worse.
Another point that I would like to make involves the down payment needed to buy a property. As members know, it was already taking people many months or even years to save up for the dreaded down payment. After eight years under a Liberal government, that down payment has doubled. The minimum down payment for an average house in Canada went from $22,000 to $45,000. The cost of housing has doubled, so of course the down payment has also doubled.
In short, Canadians have less money in their pockets to meet their basic needs. They do not have any wiggle room, but now they have to save twice as much for a down payment. That clearly does not make any sense.
When I talk about affordable housing, I think about a woman in my riding named Martine. She came to see me last week. Martine works as a cashier in a pharmacy. She lives in a decent home with her 12-year-old daughter. She has always lived modestly, but she and her daughter have always had everything they needed. Now, with inflation, that is no longer the case. She came to see me in tears saying that she could no longer make ends meet. Groceries and gas cost too much, and her rent just went up. Because she is unable to afford her rent, she is going to have to move into subsidized housing if she meets the criteria, but even that will be difficult because of a lack of availability.
I hear stories like Martine's every week. I see my constituents going into debt to cover their basic needs while the Liberals are off spending taxpayers' money. Go tell Martine, who has to choose between food and clothing, that her money is being thrown out the window, that the Liberals are spending to excess without even making Canadians' lives better.
This opposition day allows me to highlight a real problem in this country. The housing shortage and every problem that stems from it deserves a day of debate, a day of sharing ideas to force the Liberals to change their policies, which are not helping Canadians in any way whatsoever. After eight years, it is obvious.
This day also allows us to give Canadians a sense of what Canada would look like under the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition. A Conservative government will bring back common sense, in other words, homes and housing that Canadians can afford, by removing the gatekeepers to free up land and speed up building permits. We will stop the flow of infrastructure funding to municipalities that block new home construction, and we will give construction bonuses to cities that quickly give the green light to builders so that they can provide affordable housing. It is time Canadians got to enjoy a standard of living befitting a country such as ours. It is common sense.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, it has been an odd debate to follow today because we have consistently heard the message from the party opposite blaming municipalities for a lack of supply and lack of affordable housing support, and many of them are former mayors and councillors.
What I have not heard today is any one member of the Conservatives single out a municipality or tell the government which municipalities are the gatekeepers, which ones have the red tape and are blocking supply. Not one of the Conservative members have referenced that, and I hope the member opposite can assist right now in identifying a geography in Canada that is not playing its part.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, I blame the government for its inflationary spending since it came to power in 2015. Every year, it told us that it would have small deficits, but instead it posted very large deficits.
Inflation is hard on everyone. Mortgage rates have soared. That is why people are having a hard time finding housing today. The cost of groceries and electricity, among other things, has increased because of the government's spending since coming to power.
Mr. Speaker, I admit that I am very surprised to hear Conservatives proposing measures straight out of the NDP platform.
I am wondering if the tie worn by my colleague from Chicoutimi—Le Fjord is a little to the left today because he shifted his political opinions a little to the left. Again, he should opt for an orange tie to be consistent.
I also wanted to remind my Conservative colleagues that housing is a provincial jurisdiction. They should know the Constitution better than I do as a Bloc member. Subsections 92(13) and 92(16) of the Constitution stipulate that housing falls under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces.
I will reiterate that I am very surprised to see the Conservatives, and especially my friend from Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, promote the centralization of power, which is usually the hallmark of the NDP.
Let us come back to the main issue. In Drummond, we need approximately 600 housing units at present.
Can my colleague tell me how much social housing and affordable housing units are needed in his region of Chicoutimi—Le Fjord?
Mr. Speaker, I am extremely surprised by my colleague's comments. He had a lot to say there, and my answer will probably be shorter than his question.
One thing I have noticed is that, although this government has been in power for eight years, nothing is getting done. It almost feels like the Bloc Québécois is supporting the NDP-Liberal coalition. Nothing is happening, and the Bloc seems to be supporting whatever the Liberal government does. It is spending like crazy, and yet absolutely nothing is happening.
We need to try new things. We need to talk to each other. We need to change course. Fiscal arrangements could be made with the municipalities. Incentives could be paid when costs and delivery times are reduced.
There are many things we can do together.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I respect the compassion and understanding the hon. member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord has shown for those constituents who are facing a housing crisis because of the affordability question.
What I do not really understand is when I look at the Conservative motion, it looks like a bonanza for developers. It talks about upzoning, where developers will benefit, and about selling off federal properties so developers can redevelop them. Where is the mention of affordable housing, which he talked about so eloquently in his speech? Where is that in this Conservative motion?
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, I am a little surprised that the NDP would ask me that kind of question, since they are supporting the Liberals and supporting so much spending. We know that inflation has changed everything.
Before inflation got so high, people could still pay for their homes, their mortgages, their housing. Inflation has driven up the price of everything, including groceries and electricity. People can no longer make ends meet.
This is a direct result of this government's inflationary spending, all supported by the NDP. This government has been spending this way from the very beginning, when it was spending money unnecessarily because the economy was doing well.
Mr. Speaker, today I am going to share my speaking time with my hon. colleague from Davenport.
I have to admit it, I love opposition days. We get to debate issues and policies from the opposition's point of view.
It is too bad that the member for Parry Sound—Muskoka did not win the Conservative Party leadership race, because even though I do not agree with his ideas, they are a lot more sensible than the ideas of the member for Carleton. We would be better off if his party supported this member's brand of conservatism.
I believe in some parts of his motion, but I see weaknesses too. First off, provision (a) mentions “imposing clawbacks on municipalities who delay new home construction”. What would constitute a reasonable delay? Would it be based on decisions about public safety, related to drainage, for example?
[English]
That is important because it is easy to say that there are unreasonable delays by municipalities. What standard do we set for that? How do we look at smaller municipalities and what their capacities are to deliver reasonable timelines for developers versus larger cities?
I have before me an example from Huntsville of drainage work that delayed Sabrina Park attainable home construction. This is in the member opposite's riding, and he is the housing critic for the Conservative Party. The project was delayed for a year because of drainage that had to be reditched and repurposed because of concerns from the municipality.
Is the member for Parry Sound—Muskoka suggesting that the Government of Canada should claw back some of the money that we would be sending for infrastructure after those types of delays, or not? That is a question that needs to be asked and to be figured out. It is easy to talk about this in principle, but what does the member actually mean by a reasonable delay.
An hon. member: He wants to add gatekeepers.
Mr. Kody Blois: Who are these gatekeepers? We have heard that during the debate. I would like to see the Conservative Party start to name the individuals in question. I am not against the principle of trying to reduce red tape whatsoever, but the principle of how we go about this has to be a little more nuanced than what the Conservative Party is throwing forward right now.
The next part on provision (a) is allocating infrastructure dollars to municipalities based on housing built. Does the town of Kentville, which might build 25 houses a year, have a reasonable standard? Where do we go? Is it based on a percentage? If the City of Toronto builds 500, is that a reasonable standard? Who determines this? With the different nuances and sizes of municipalities across the country, how would we even go about this?
What about municipalities that are doing a good job and are above the average? Let us say one of the standards was to try to give municipalities money, as is in this motion, on the basis of the success of building new houses. If a municipality was a laggard, we would give more money to it versus municipalities that had been doing a good job, which might not be able to demonstrably show they are improving their housing stock in the same fashion because they were doing a good job before. Is that really the position of the Conservative Party right now? I have my concerns.
The Conservatives are essentially suggesting that, if there is local leadership, and that is in their view, not ours, but I will speak for them, they think we should punish Canadians where local leadership is not being lived up to and we should somehow cut federal infrastructure support to those communities. Again, I want to know who they think has poor leadership at the local level so I can know whether or not they are suggesting that the Government of Canada should be pulling back infrastructure dollars in my community. I would certainly like to know where they stand, other than just creating these arbitrary words about gatekeepers and creating these villains without naming who they are. Let us pull back the mask and see who we are talking about.
[Translation]
The provincial governments are in the best position to issue construction permits, considering their constitutional authority over municipalities. However, they must use this authority in a reasonable manner.
[English]
I do think the provincial governments, because of their constitutional relationship, are better arbiters of being able to help intervene, where necessary, in a reasonable fashion.
Before I go to Statements by Members, I want to remind hon. members that, when they bring friends to the House of Commons, especially when they are in the back by the lobbies, they should make sure they keep the volume of their friends down a bit. During a couple of speeches, there was lots of noise going on in the lobbies. I would ask that members keep their conversations down a minimum roar so that conversations can be held here in the House of Commons.
Statements by Members
[Statements by Members]
[English]
Health Care Workers
Mr. Speaker, health care workers are the backbone of our health care system in Canada, and members of the Service Employees International Union play a crucial role in delivering quality care to patients across this country. From PSWs and nurses to support staff and caregivers, these dedicated individuals work tirelessly to ensure that Canadians receive the best possible care. Through their hard work and dedication, SEIU members have helped to improve health care outcomes for millions of Canadians. They were on the front lines during the pandemic, putting their own health at risk to care for others.
However, their contributions go beyond just health care. SEIU members are also leaders in advocating for better working conditions and fair wages, not just for themselves but for all workers.
I would like to invite all members of the House to join the SEIU this evening at 6 p.m., in room 325 in the Wellington Building, to take a moment to recognize members' invaluable contributions and personally thank them for their service.
Mental Health Week
Mr. Speaker, this morning, parliamentarians, members of the military, veterans and the mental health community gathered for the 10th annual Sam Sharpe mental health breakfast.
We heard a song from Terry Kelly and a keynote speech from retired Major Mark Campbell, a 30-year veteran of the military, a proud PPCLI officer and someone who was gravely injured on his second tour in Afghanistan, losing both lower limbs and suffering from major physical and mental injuries. He spoke in raw form about his recovery from the mental and physical wounds of service. He spoke about the impact of those wounds on Donna and their children. He spoke about his frustration with Ottawa and challenged us to do better as a nation. However, Mark also provided hope, talking about how the Soldier On program and peer supports helped him, as well as how we are making progress. That is why Roméo Dallaire and I started this breakfast 10 years ago.
I want to thank the Hon. Roméo Dallaire. I also want to thank the hon. member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound and Senator Rebecca Patterson, two great veterans themselves, for carrying on this important discussion on mental health each Mental Health Week.
We must honour those who serve. This event gives hope, healing and purpose to our veterans and first responders.
Gordon Lightfoot
Mr. Speaker, yesterday evening, I was deeply saddened to hear of the death of Canadian icon Gordon Lightfoot.
With a career spanning over six decades, Lightfoot's music captured the hearts of generations of Canadians and fans worldwide. His songs reflected the Canadian experience, from the vast beauty of our country's landscapes to the struggles and triumphs of our people. The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald remains a haunting and powerful commemoration of the people who lost their lives in a tragic event.
Lightfoot's talent and contributions to the Canadian music industry were widely recognized. He received many accolades throughout his career, including from the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, and won numerous awards, including the Order of Canada and the Governor General's Performing Arts Award.
As we mourn his passing, we also celebrate his legacy, which will live on in the dynamic Canadian soundscape he helped shape. On behalf of all Canadians, we extend our heartfelt condolences to his family and friends.
Gordon Lightfoot will be greatly missed, but his music will live on forever.
[Translation]
Two Quebeckers in the NFL
Mr. Speaker, Quebeckers will have two new reasons to watch NFL games. Two of our own heard their names called in the draft last week.
Victoriaville's Matthew Bergeron was selected in the second round by the Atlanta Falcons, after an outstanding run on the offensive line at Syracuse University and the Cégep de Thetford. The 23-year-old bulldozer is expected to clear a path straight to the end zone for running back Bijan Robinson.
Sidy Sow, another titanic offensive lineman, will stick closer to his native Bromont after being drafted in the fourth round by the New England Patriots. A standout player for Eastern Michigan and Champlain College, his extraordinary athleticism will be a crucial part of Bill Belichick's efforts to return to the top of the division.
Quebec has become a hotbed of talent, and Quebeckers will proudly follow these two young men, just as they followed Laurent Duvernay-Tardif and Tshimanga Biakabutuka.
I wish our new NFL pros a great season.
[English]
Keira's Law
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my eternal gratitude to my colleagues in this chamber, who voted unanimously for Bill C-233, also known as Keira’s law. I extend my heartfelt appreciation to Senator Dalphond, who sponsored the bill in the Senate, and the senators, organizations and individuals who supported this fundamental change to the Criminal Code of Canada.
Last week, the bill received royal assent. My colleagues have all worked together to help break the cycle of violence and empower those who are suffering. This legislation will strengthen laws surrounding domestic violence and coercive control.
[Translation]
For the first time ever under the Criminal Code, coercive control will have to be taken into consideration, since it is guaranteed that all judges will receive training on domestic violence and coercive control.
In addition, electronic bracelets will provide greater safety and peace of mind for complainants. This law sends a clear message to abusive spouses: Our justice system is equipped to monitor all aspects of their behaviour, even the subtle and devious ones.
[English]
Giant Axonal Neuropathy
Mr. Speaker, May 2 is Curly Hair Day. Giant axonal neuropathy is a rare childhood genetic disorder; it affects the nervous system, and it is terminal. There are 73 cases of GAN in the world. Two such cases are in Alberta. One of these is our grandson, Julian.
There are international pilot projects that could offer unique research therapies for this and other genetic conditions, but what we lack is the ability to seamlessly coordinate such projects.
One of the symptoms that led to the diagnosis of GAN for Julian was his tightly curled hair. This marker, which is so obvious in this disorder, sparked an initiative called Hannah's Hope Fund, which calls for May 2 to be Curly Hair Day. To support these children and their families in the struggle for a cure, I encourage members to think about them every May 2.
Garry Watson
Mr. Speaker, I rise to honour the memory of Garry Watson, a founding father of Whistler ski resort. He was as responsible as any person for making Whistler the greatest ski resort and ski community in the world.
In 1960, Garry saw the potential that Whistler presented as a world-class ski resort, and he dreamed that it would one day host the winter Olympics. By 1966, he had helped open the area to skiers. Garry served three terms on Whistler council, including its inaugural edition, and he was instrumental in creating the vibrant and walkable town centre that makes the village special. He helped create and sustain a world-renowned model for workforce housing with the Whistler Housing Authority, and he consistently gave back to the community, including through the Whistler Community Foundation and Whistler Health Care Foundation.
Garry was rightly awarded a well-used lifetime ski pass, freedom of the municipality, the Citizen of the Year award and the Community Achievement Award from B.C.’s Lieutenant Governor. Garry’s dream for Whistler was eventually realized when it hosted the 2010 Olympic Winter Games.
Beyond these achievements, Garry will forever be remembered as a loving husband and someone who was always a willing and cherished mentor.
Justice
Mr. Speaker, I recently met with a constituent of mine, Patty Seyers, who bravely shared her story of survival after sexual violence and the revictimization that survivors often face throughout the justice system process.
Patty mentioned that publication bans are meant to protect the identity of victims, but they are too often used to protect the accused and even perpetrators found guilty of sexual-based crimes. Many survivors and advocates are on the Hill this week, hosting an event tonight called My Voice, My Choice with the member for Victoria.
I encourage all members to listen to this advocacy and support passing legislation to give back survivors’ voices, choices and consent. It took Patty four years to have the publication ban on her case lifted. Today, I wanted to use the voice I have in this place to tell her story and share the bravery of so many others like her who are sharing their experiences to bring change and equality to our justice system.
Dutch Heritage Day
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise as the co-chair of the Canada-Netherlands Parliamentary Friendship Group to recognize the very special bond between these two countries.
In anticipation of May 5, Dutch Heritage Day, we will be celebrating in Ottawa this afternoon. In Holland, May 5 is, of course, the day Dutch people celebrate Bevrijdingsdag, or Liberation Day, when Canadian soldiers played a major role in their liberation during World War II. For this reason, I am pleased to invite all members of Parliament to join us this afternoon for a special reception with the Netherlands’ ambassador to Canada, hosted by the Speaker. We look forward to marking this special occasion with all members as we continue our work to grow the special relationship between Canada and the Netherlands, be it through commerce, culture or people-to-people ties.
It goes without saying that the million-plus Canadians of Dutch descent have played a major role in shaping Canadian culture and society. Fijne Bevrijdingsdag. I wish everyone a happy Dutch Heritage Day.
Genocide Education
Mr. Speaker, in April, members of Parliament observed commemorations of the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide and the genocide in Rwanda.
Remembering is vital, but education is equally important, if not more so. Racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and other forms of hate are proliferating today at an alarming rate, especially online. We need our children to know about the history of genocide and where hate can lead.
[Translation]
I want to congratulate the Foundation for Genocide Education and its founder, Heidi Berger, for working with the Government of Quebec over the past eight years to create an online teaching guide featuring case studies of nine 20th century genocides. The French version of the guide has been available to high school history teachers across Canada since 2022, while the English version has been available since April 27.
[English]
I again call on our provinces and territories to introduce mandatory genocide education, using the guide “Studying Genocide” as the main resource, so that Canada’s youth will learn the consequences of hate and intolerance.
[Translation]
First Responders
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the mayor of Baie‑Saint‑Paul, Michaël Pilote, had to declare a state of emergency because of the devastation caused by heavy rainfall. However, that was not all. Two firefighters who went to the rescue of people trapped by the flooding in Saint-Urbain were carried away by floodwaters. They are still missing. Our thoughts are with the family and friends of these two heroes.
It is with great humility that I wish to honour the sacrifices of first responders. They put their heart and soul into helping their fellow citizens. They give everything they have to help those in danger.
Members of the Paramedic Association of Canada are in Ottawa to meet with their MPs, tell them about the challenges they face every day and show them how dedicated they are to the well-being of Canadians.
Firefighters, police officers and paramedics deserve our respect. All Canadians have a place in their heart for these first responders because they recognize how important first responders are and how difficult their job is. No one appreciates them better than those who have needed their services in the past.
We hope that the two firefighters who were swept away will be found safe and sound. Let us remain hopeful.
[English]
Liberal Party of Canada
Mr. Speaker, after eight years under the Prime Minister, Canadians are struggling; however, Conservatives have a plan to make Canada work for the people who do the work. We will bring home lower prices by ending inflationary deficits and scrapping the carbon tax on gas, groceries and home heating. We will bring home more powerful paycheques by cutting taxes and clawbacks to reward hard work, as well as bringing in homes that people can afford by getting rid of the gatekeepers and freeing up land to build on. We will bring home safe streets by ending the Liberals' broken catch-and-release bail system. We will bring home freedom from foreign election interference and woke government censorship.
We have a lot of work to do, but we are ready to get into the driver's seat. We are going to bring it home for Canadians.
[Translation]
Mental Health Week
Mr. Speaker, today I want to talk about Mental Health Week. This year's theme, “My Story”, is about sharing stories and experiences with others to improve our mental health, fight stigma and help others feel less alone.
Talking about mental health is important every day, but this week is an excellent opportunity to highlight how important it is to be aware of our own mental health and that of those around us. A great way to learn more is to visit the Wellness Together portal or check out the resources at mentalhealthliteracy.org.
Together, we can build a better, healthier future for everyone, a future in which all Canadians know enough about mental health to recognize when their family members, their friends or they themselves are struggling and know how to access the mental health support they need.
Let us take care of each other.
[English]
Identification Services
Mr. Speaker, thousands of people across Canada are unable to access crucial support because of gaps in identification services. In Victoria, the Community Social Planning Council is working to change this through its monthly ID clinics. It has helped over 750 individuals in our community.
The council's team helps underserved community members to obtain verified copies of their identification. This means that they can access a range of essential services, including housing, health care, banking, immigration services and employment. Without a physical copy of their ID, an individual is excluded from most aspects of our social safety net. When I recently met with their executive director, Diana Gibson, she shared that their ID clinics would not be able to continue to operate without over $210,000 of annual funding. They have been unable to find federal funding to sustainably support their clinics. These are some of the most marginalized members of our community, and we need the government to fund these services, to invest in the future and to give opportunities to Canadians from all socio-economic backgrounds.
My thanks go to the Community Social Planning Council for all the important work it does.
[Translation]
Flooding in Quebec
Mr. Speaker, the wet spring has caused many rivers in Quebec to overflow, and many municipalities are grappling with severe flooding.
In Lanaudière, residents have had to evacuate, and the situation in the Outaouais and Laurentides remains critical. In Charlevoix, Baie‑Saint‑Paul has been divided in two by the Gouffre River, which tragically swept away two firefighters yesterday. They are still missing. Our hearts go out to their loved ones as they await news, and to everyone whose lives have been turned upside down by the forces of nature.
Even after the flood waters recede, residents' troubles will be far from over. Repairing the damage will take a lot of effort, and going back to life as normal will take an act of courage.
To help our constituents overcome this ordeal, we have a vital role to play as their elected representatives. We have a duty to make ourselves useful, contribute toward solutions and come to the aid of the hardest-hit disaster victims. In the face of this spring flooding, we must show unwavering solidarity.
[English]
Gordon Lightfoot
Mr. Speaker, a cloud hangs over the “Sunshine City” as we mourn the passing of the legendary Gordon Lightfoot. Gordon Lightfoot was born in Orillia in 1938. He sang choir at St. Paul's United Church and performed on numerous occasions at the ODCVI high school.
It was his connection to the Canadian atmosphere and the environment around him that made him special. He is to Canadian music what the Group of Seven is to Canadian art. Indeed, Gordon said, “I simply write the songs about where I am and where I’m from”.
His presence was synonymous with the Mariposa Folk Festival. He headlined it countless times and even supported the festival when it struggled financially. In 2022, he was inducted into the Mariposa Hall of Fame.
Tom Wilson perhaps said it best: “Gordon Lightfoot lives in our blood; he’s the soundtrack to some of our greatest and most beautiful memories as well as some of our biggest disasters and has comforted us in those times.”
We extend condolences to his family and friends and thank them for sharing Gordon and his talents with us.
Durham Region Public Transit Infrastructure
Mr. Speaker, well, I have fantastic news for Durham Region to share today: 104 new electric buses and charging infrastructure, 8,000 tonnes of carbon emissions reduced per year and $74 million in federal support. That is $12 million in funding through the Canada community building fund and $62 million in financing through the Canada Infrastructure Bank.
This large investment in zero-emission buses will dramatically improve the public transit system that connects our region, making it easier to get around while improving air quality and helping fight climate change.
It is innovative federal financing like this that helps regional governments like Durham Region afford the needed updates to our public transit infrastructure. Unlike the Conservatives, our government invests in communities and infrastructure, demonstrating concrete action for a greener and more sustainable future.
It is a great day for Durham Region.
Keira's Law
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my eternal gratitude to my colleagues in this chamber who voted unanimously for Bill C- 233, also known as “Keira’s law”.
I express my heartfelt appreciation for Senator Dalphond, who sponsored my bill at the Senate, and senators, organizations and individuals who supported this fundamental change to the Criminal Code of Canada. This bill received royal assent last week.
We have all worked very hard to break the cycle of violence and empower those who are suffering. This legislation will strengthen laws surrounding domestic violence and coercive control.
[Translation]
For the very first time in the context of the Criminal Code, coercive control will be taken into account, because all judges will now be required to receive training on intimate partner violence and coercive control.
Electronic monitoring devices will also provide complainants with greater safety, security and peace of mind. This law sends an unmistakable message to violent intimate partners.
ORAL QUESTIONS
[Oral Questions]
[Translation]
Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, for two years, the government knew that an agent for Beijing made arrangements to intimidate the family of a Canadian MP in response to a vote in the House of Commons.
The government knew about this two years ago, yet it kept the agent accredited, allowing him to continue threatening the MP's family and other Canadians of Chinese origin.
Why did the Prime Minister not take action?
Mr. Speaker, that is simply not true. It is irresponsible to suggest that our government would sit on such a matter.
Based on briefings that I received following yesterday's story, I know that steps have been taken to protect members when they could attract the attention of foreign actors because of the legitimate work they do in this place.
Our security agencies will continue to independently do this important work, and I have, indeed, been in touch with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills to reassure him on this.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, he has reached out to reassure him on the subject. That might have been something to do two years ago.
Two years ago, in July 2021, the government had a CSIS document showing that an agent for the dictatorship in Beijing was arranging to sanction and punish the family of a Canadian MP because of how he voted on the floor of the House of Commons. Yet, for two years, this Prime Minister's government kept that agent accredited with diplomatic immunity, allowing him to abuse countless other Canadians of Chinese origin. How can we believe anything he says about protecting our national interests?
Mr. Speaker, that is simply not true. It is actually irresponsible to suggest that any government might sit on a matter of such seriousness.
Based on briefings that I received following yesterday's story, I know that steps have been taken to protect members when they could be in the spotlight of foreign actors because of the legitimate work they do in this place.
Our security agencies will continue to independently do this important work, and I have, indeed, followed up directly with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills to reassure him on this.
Mr. Speaker, we can forgive the member for Wellington—Halton Hills for not feeling reassured. Nobody should feel reassured.
The Prime Minister says that my question was false. What was false in it? We know there was a July 2021 document, two years ago, showing that an agent for the dictatorship in Beijing was threatening the family of a Canadian MP because he had stood up for human rights on the floor of this House of Commons.
Now, normally that would be a criminal offence for anyone to do, but this individual has immunity granted by this government. Has the Prime Minister taken away that immunity and kicked the diplomat out of Canada, yes or no?
Mr. Speaker, I think outside of this House, where there is extraordinary partisanship and sometimes personal attacks, most Canadians understand that no government of any stripe would see a direct threat on a member of this Parliament, and their family, and sit on it and not ensure anything was acted upon. It is simply unworthy of anyone sitting in this House to make those kinds of accusations. I can assure members opposite that we continue to take any threats seriously.
Mr. Speaker, I have to confess that, until 48 hours ago, I would have agreed that no government would ever sit on threats of this nature over two years long. However, unfortunately, what we have learned is that it is exactly what this Prime Minister did.
The government knew, in July of 2021, that an agent acting for the dictatorship in Beijing, accredited to work at the consulate in Toronto, was threatening a family member of a Canadian parliamentarian, and the Prime Minister's government knew about it and did absolutely nothing. Why?
Mr. Speaker, that is simply not true. I spoke with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills earlier today and ensured that he got a briefing from our top security officials to ensure that he gets all the information he needs. A core part of CSIS's mandate is to provide briefings and take action whenever a threat exists, and those same top security officials have confirmed that whenever there is action to take, they do so.
Mr. Speaker, and yet he did absolutely nothing other than to hold a meeting with the MP after the information became public. The Prime Minister was not interested in protecting Canadians; he was interesting in protecting his political reputation.
The Prime Minister has the power to kick this diplomat out. Think of it: If a Canadian had threatened an MP or his family over a vote in the House, that Canadian would be in jail. This individual cannot be arrested because of diplomatic immunity granted by the current government, which is something the Prime Minister could take away any time he wants. Why is he keeping this agent in our country, threatening our people?
Mr. Speaker, once again, what the member opposite is proposing is actually not the truth. We are actually continuing to work with our security agencies in ensuring that whenever threats arise against Canadians those security agencies take action. They offer briefings, offer support and offer information as necessary and as appropriate every step of the way. That is what our security agencies do to keep Canadians safe. To suggest that anyone in this House would see a threat to a colleague and simply sit on it is unworthy of parliamentarians.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, I have to admit that I do not understand what part of the Leader of the Opposition's questions was not true. I therefore support the Leader of the Opposition's questions.
I have a question for the Prime Minister of a country that China holds in such contempt that it sees it as an easy target. If the person responsible for Pierre Elliott Trudeau's legacy at the Trudeau Foundation were to be called in for questioning by the CRA, the committee or whoever, would the Prime Minister recuse himself from participating in any way—
Mr. Speaker, I can assure the Bloc Québécois leader that, here in Canada, we have robust institutions that ensure political interference in our judicial processes and our rigorous regulatory processes is neither facilitated nor allowed. In any of these hypothetical scenarios, legal processes would proceed as necessary.
Mr. Speaker, here we go again.
If a competent authority, be it the committee, the CRA or any other entity—who knows—were to look into possible irregularities on the part of the Prime Minister's brother, would he consider the possibility that he is not qualified to make decisions with respect to an independent public inquiry into Chinese interference?
Mr. Speaker, despite the best efforts of the leader of the Bloc Québécois over the past few weeks, one fact has not changed, not in all these weeks, and not in 10 years. That is the fact that I have had no direct or indirect involvement in the operations of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, the Beijing government targeted a member of this House and targeted not only the member but the member's family. The Prime Minister knew about this and did nothing. Frankly, I am disappointed. This goes beyond partisan politics. This is about the ability for people in this House to be able to vote their conscience. Why did the Prime Minister not inform the member that his family was being threatened? What will the Prime Minister commit to doing to make sure this never happens again?
Mr. Speaker, it would be outrageous for anyone in this House to see a direct threat at an individual sitting in this House or to their family and do nothing and that did not happen. I will be absolutely unequivocal about that and that is why we were pleased to be able to offer a full briefing to the member for Wellington—Halton Hills so he could ask questions of the top intelligence officials and ensure that we will continue as institutions, as a government and as security services to do everything necessary to keep Canadians safe.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, honestly, that is hard to take. Clearly, this government could not care less about the damage caused by its inaction on foreign interference. Clearly, the Prime Minister must have known that the member's family was facing threats abroad.
What will it take for this Prime Minister to take action and immediately launch a public inquiry?
Mr. Speaker, we have been taking action since 2015.
When we hosted the G7 in 2018, we created a mechanism with our allies to fight interference. In 2019, we set up a committee of national security experts to safeguard the integrity of our elections.
We also created a committee of parliamentarians to examine security and intelligence matters, as well as a review committee within the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency.
We are still doing everything necessary with an independent expert responsible for looking into all matters related to—
[English]
Mr. Speaker, the government has had 24 hours to get some basic facts about PRC diplomats targeting of MPs, but here is my question.
On September 10, 2019, the public safety minister issued a directive to CSIS ordering the service to inform the minister of any matter or action of interest to the minister.
When was the public safety minister or his office first made aware that a PRC diplomat, Mr. Wei Zhao, was targeting me or my family?
Mr. Speaker, as this is the first occasion that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills has risen since this matter was brought to the attention of the public and this chamber, I want to express solidarity to him and to his family. We will continue to work with him and all parliamentarians to make sure he and all parliamentarians get the support they need.
Since the outset, when we took the reins of government, we have been vigilant in fighting against foreign interference. We have put in place the people, the resources, the tools and the oversight, as the Prime Minister just said, to defend our institutions. We will do that work together.
Before we go to the next question, I want to remind hon. members that calling each other names is not parliamentary language.
The hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
Mr. Speaker, the directive of September 10, 2019, is clear. It says:
The Service has a duty to inform the Minister of any such matter as is relevant to enable the Minister to fulfill the Minister’s accountabilities as outlined in the CSIS Act.
In general terms, the Minister expects to be consulted or informed regarding any action on which a Deputy Head would normally involve his or her Minister.
My question, again, is very simple. When did the public safety minister or his office first become aware that a PRC diplomat was targeting a member of the House and their family?
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague across the aisle for highlighting the directive that this government has put in place to ensure transparency and accountability around decisions, which are taken independently by our non-partisan professional public servants when it comes to which classified information is made public and which must remain classified to protect the people who work in that space.
This is not a partisan issue. We must all work together to defend the institutions, the communities and, most important, the parliamentarians who serve those institutions to protect our democracy.
Mr. Speaker, what a gutless response. What if that happened to that minister's family? I have the same question. When did he know?
Mr. Speaker, as I have just said, it is our non-partisan independent public servants who make decisions around operations, including which classified information is made public, and for good reason. It is important that we protect the people who work in those institutions, not only to protect our national security but to protect the people who work within these institutions, including parliamentarians.
Let me just say that it is outrageous to make the claim that any member of Parliament would stand for any attack on any parliamentarian. We are united in fighting against foreign interference.
Mr. Speaker, my colleague can continue to ask the same question and she will get the same answer.
It is this government that has raised the bar on transparency, when it comes to protecting our institutions, by creating a committee of parliamentarians, by creating NSIRA. By the way, I would point out the Conservatives had nearly 10 years to create those institutions and they never did.
Rather than suggesting that we stand up, I suggest they now stand up and get behind the cause of the government so we can protect all parliamentarians and our institutions.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, on September 10, 2019, CSIS received a ministerial directive to inform the minister of public safety of any disturbing fact concerning foreign interference.
I will ask the Minister of Public Safety a simple question: When did he learn that a Beijing diplomat was threatening a member of the House?
Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to my colleague, that is the same question and I will give the same answer.
The government increased the level of transparency by creating a committee of parliamentarians to examine national security issues and by creating the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency, or NSIRA. We will continue to work with all members to protect our institutions, and, more importantly, with all the people and all MPs who work in this institution to protect democracy. That is the most important thing.
Mr. Speaker, things are moving quickly today. The Liberals keep lecturing about democratic values when anyone asks them about the foreign interference they are involved in.
Let us talk about democratic values.
The Prime Minister was warned by CSIS that China was threatening an MP and his family. Any democrat worth their salt would have alerted that MP, whether they be a Conservative, Liberal, Bloc or NDP member. However, the Prime Minister again chose secrecy. By prioritizing partisan secrecy over a family's safety, he has crossed the line into the unacceptable.
When will there be an independent public inquiry?
Mr. Speaker, with all due respect to my colleague, it is absolutely outrageous that the Bloc Québécois would suggest that this government stood idly by on an issue such as this one, which affected a member of Parliament and his family.
This is why the government has created tools to give our communities certain national security responsibilities in order to defend everyone working in our institutions. We will remain vigilant on this issue.
Mr. Speaker, in the meantime, CSIS is warning that Beijing sees Canada as a high-priority target for interference.
Obviously, it is easy for China. China could get close to the Prime Minister through the Trudeau Foundation. China could get close to the Liberals at their own $1,500-a-head cocktail parties during their first term. Then, when China gets caught by CSIS doing things like threatening the family of an elected member, the Liberals keep it a secret.
Do the Liberals realize that it is their fault that China is infiltrating our institutions with disturbing ease?
Mr. Speaker, as I already explained, this government is truly proactive when it comes to dealing with the challenge of foreign interference.
That is why we gave more powers to CSIS. That is why we introduced Bill C‑76 to crack down on foreign contributions that could pose a threat to our institutions.
We will continue to do this important work to protect communities, institutions and, more importantly, all Canadians.
Mr. Speaker, why are we still talking about this today? It is because the Liberals have chosen their culture of secrecy over full transparency.
It is their culture of secrecy that increases foreign interference: secrecy about China's connections through the Trudeau Foundation; secrecy about China interfering in democracy; secrecy about Chinese threats towards the family of an elected official.
From day one, the Prime Minister could have been transparent with an independent and public commission of inquiry. Will he go down with his secrets, taking the Liberal Party with him?
Mr. Speaker, my colleague knows very well that our government took foreign interference and threats seriously from the outset. We implemented several measures in the first few months of our mandate, and we strengthened them in the months and years that followed.
The good news is that the Right Hon. David Johnston is on the job and will make independent recommendations because he is an expert who knows the facts. The government will take action to further enhance the measures immediately.
[English]
I want to remind the hon. members that unparliamentary language is not welcome in the chamber. Calling people names is not permitted. It is not the first time. It is not the second time. I want to remind the hon. member that the next time I will have to take his question away from him.
The hon. member for Calgary Forest Lawn.
Mr. Speaker, when did the minister find out that a member of the House was threatened by a foreign diplomat from Beijing?
Mr. Speaker, if the Conservatives continue to pose the same question, they will get the same answer.
At the very core of the premise of those questions is the suggestion that somehow this government does not care about the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills. Nothing could be further from the truth. We may have disagreements in this chamber about domestic and foreign policy, but we will always stand united behind the right of all members to do their job to represent their constituencies, because that is a fundamental value of standing up for democracy.
Mr. Speaker, since we continue to get the same question in a broken-record format, let me highlight exactly what we are doing to combat foreign interference.
We introduced Bill C-59 to give CSIS additional threat reduction measure powers. We introduced Bill C-76 to crack down on foreign funding. We introduced the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians so we could work across partisan lines. We finally introduced NSIRA to ensure transparency on how we do this work to Canadians.
What is the distinction? We did those things; the Conservatives opposed.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, the responses are not answering the questions we are asking. Once again, we are asking a very simple question.
When did cabinet and the minister find out that a member of the House of Commons was being harassed by Beijing?
Mr. Speaker, as I have explained several times now, decisions about what information should or should not be shared with the public are made by our public servants, who work in an independent and non-partisan manner. Yes, I will be working with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills to brief him and share information, because this government is there to protect not only that member, but everyone who works in the House.
Mr. Speaker, it is a very simple question that deserves a clear answer.
When did the government find out that the Communist regime in Beijing was threatening people elected to the House of Commons?
Mr. Speaker, I think my hon. colleague understands the answer now. I hope that he and all of his colleagues will change their position on national security issues and challenges and support all of the government's efforts, such as creating new powers, increasing transparency and, most importantly, protecting democratic institutions as well as everyone who works in those institutions.
[English]
Indigenous Affairs
Mr. Speaker, the ongoing genocide of missing and murdered indigenous women, girls, transwomen, gender non-conforming and two-spirit people is a Canada-wide emergency. Relatives of lost loved ones, human rights advocates and survivors are calling on the government to take action to end this unrelenting violence. We are not disposable. Our lives are precious and we deserve justice.
Will the Liberals recognize this ongoing genocide as a Canada-wide emergency?
Mr. Speaker, I think the answer to that is a resounding yes. Yesterday, I was in Val-d'Or to underline a $60-million investment in the Friendship Centre there, which will allow people to use Val-d'Or as a regional hub and to get the culturally sensitive and appropriate care they need. That will save lives and address the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.
This is a tragedy, but doing public policy by tragedy only leads to tragic results. I can only direct people to the final report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls to see the systematic work that needs to be done by our government, the provincial governments and municipal governments to make sure—
The hon. member for Timmins—James Bay.
Natural Resources
Mr. Speaker, Canada needs to get its critical mineral supply chain off the ground, but Doug Ford has thrown a major spike in this by doing away with the duty for mining companies to come up with the funds for environmental cleaning. There is not a first nation anywhere that will allow mining without the guarantees for closure. Doug Ford is now driving his bulldozer all over the duty to consult and the result is Treaty 9 has launched a $95-billion lawsuit against Doug Ford and the government.
What steps will the minister take to ensure that sustainability and the duty to consult remain at the heart of our critical mineral strategy?
Mr. Speaker, the way we can get good projects built, including the critical mineral projects that are essential for the energy transition and offer an enormous economic opportunity to this country, is to do things the right way by respecting the rights of indigenous communities, ensuring that we are consulting thoroughly, working with indigenous communities as partners in these projects and ensuring that we are doing thorough environmental assessments. That is how we move projects forward.
That is very different from the gutting of the environmental assessment process that happened under Stephen Harper and the Conservatives. We are committed that going forward—
The hon. member for St. John's East.
Labour
Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada believes in the collective bargaining process and the best deals are the ones that are reached at the table. Public servants work hard to deliver important services to Canadians.
Could the President of the Treasury Board update the House on negotiations with the Public Service Alliance of Canada?
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the MP for St. John's East for her tireless work for constituents.
After many weeks of hard work, negotiation and compromise, the government has reached tentative agreements with PSAC for the core public administration. We appreciate Canadians' patience and understanding over this time because the best deals are reached at the bargaining table. We are deeply grateful for the public servants who work hard to serve Canadians. These deals are fair, competitive and reasonable, and bring stability to public servants and Canadians.
Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, the minister is right that it would be outrageous for a government minister to know that a foreign agent was granted credentials by the government to carry out threats against an MP's family because of a vote held in the House of Commons. That would be outrageous.
The only way we can know if it actually happened is if the minister tells us when he saw this briefing note or any related information showing that the MP's family was threatened. When did he learn of it?
Mr. Speaker, there have been a number of questions on this issue. I agree with my Conservative colleague, in a moment of some consensus, that decisions regarding national security and intelligence should not be politicized.
I would certainly hope that this is not what the Conservative leader is now suggesting, yet it was him who said, a little more than a month ago, that when he was the minister responsible for democratic institutions, he knew about these things and he did not act because he did not think it was in his interest to do so. Let us now unite—
Mr. Speaker, we do have to put the partisanship aside. It would have been a non-partisan act for the government to protect the MP's family, even though he is from another party. It would have been a non-partisan act to strip away the diplomatic immunity and kick this foreign agent out of country, yet the government did not do that.
We now need to know the facts. The briefing note showing these threats occurred was produced in July 2021. When did the minister find out?
Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat encouraged. At least the Conservative leader is now using the right words for a change, in that he is saying it is non-partisan, which is what the government has been saying for months now on this issue. I have said to the Conservative leader and the member for Wellington—Halton Hills that we will work with them to get them the information on this issue.
CSIS has offered a briefing to the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, and the Conservatives now, finally, hopefully after some reflection, will agree to work with the government to protect our institutions and the people who work in this chamber.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, if the government knew that an MP's family was being threatened by a foreign agent and did nothing to kick that agent out, that is an outrage. The briefing on this incident is from July 2021. We need to know when the minister found out that these threats had been made against a member of the House of Commons and his family.
Mr. Speaker, it is absolutely outrageous that the leader of the Conservatives would suggest that the government has no concern for the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. I contacted him yesterday to offer support and to offer a briefing with CSIS. This government is committed to working with all members of the House to protect our institutions and everyone who works here.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, this is a question of the gravest importance. There is a member of Parliament, of the House of Commons, whose family has been threatened because of the way he voted here. How can we defend national security on the floor of the House of Commons if our family members are being threatened based on the votes that we cast? We need to know whether the government is protecting us against that, or we cannot do our work.
Therefore, I will ask this one last time: When did the minister know that these threats were directed at this MP's family?
Mr. Speaker, as I have said now on numerous occasions, decisions regarding what information that touches on security and intelligence is released into the public domain are made by our independent and non-partisan public servants. We have reached out to the member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
The government's commitment is to work with him and all members of this chamber so we can do the work of protecting our institutions, our communities and, most importantly, the people who represent, in this chamber, the 338 ridings. We will do that work in a non-partisan way.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Canadian Heritage told us the monarchy is not a priority for the government. It is so far down the list of priorities that the Liberals put recognition of King Charles III in the budget. It is so far down the list of priorities that the Prime Minister will be leaving his party's convention to attend the coronation of the King of Canada, his King. He could have sent someone in his stead, like a minister, but prostrating himself before the King is his priority.
Sometimes I think this is just embarrassing. Is it not time to get rid of the monarchy?
Mr. Speaker, the Bloc members are really something. They get up in the morning, brush their teeth and start thinking about the monarchy. They are obsessed. They look at the paper but do not read articles about the climate change crisis. They do not look at articles about how to grow the economy. They do not pay attention to the work the House is doing around investing to attract businesses.
No, they want to talk about democracy. Actually, they want to talk about the monarchy. They are focused on the monarchy, but we are going to focus on Canadians' priorities.
Mr. Speaker, he said a word that is not usually part of his vocabulary, the word “democracy”. I will say no more, but if people could read my mind, they would get it.
The Prime Minister of New Zealand would like his country to become a republic. The ambassador of Australia in London is saying the same thing. England is about to get rid of its King before we do, but no matter. However, a majority of Canadians, the population of Quebec and Canada, want to cut ties with the Crown.
In the House, apart from the Bloc Québécois, no one is saying a word. It seems like everyone is a monarchist. Does this government truly think it knows better than the population of Quebec, Canada, New Zealand, Australia—
Mr. Speaker, other members of the House might want to talk about things like the economy and social programs, whether they agree or disagree. We talk about all kinds of things: how to invest here at home, how to attract businesses, how to help our seniors, how to help our students, how to help our families, how to help our young people.
They are fixated on constitutional change. That is what they want to talk about. We will be over here focusing on the priorities of Quebeckers and Canadians.
[English]
Health
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals teamed up with the B.C. NDP on drug decriminalization policies.
Some hon. members: Hear, hear!
Mrs. Tracy Gray: Mr. Speaker, now parents are more afraid than ever to take their kids to playgrounds and parks due to open drug use. Law enforcement are now handcuffed and can only stand by and watch. Because—
If I could just interrupt for a moment. I am going to have to ask the member to repeat the question. I was not able to hear it because of all the ruckus.
The hon. member for Kelowna—Lake Country can take it from the top, please.
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals teamed up with the B.C. NDP on drug decriminalization policies.
Some hon. members: Hear, hear!
Mrs. Tracy Gray: Mr. Speaker, now parents are more afraid than ever to take their kids to playgrounds and—
I am not sure how often they want to hear it repeated, but we will start it again, from the top. I want to remind—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
The Speaker: Order. The hon. member for Kelowna—Lake Country has the floor.
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals teamed up with the B.C. NDP on drug decriminalization policies.
Now parents are more afraid than ever to take their kids to playgrounds and parks due to open drug use. Law enforcement are now handcuffed and can only stand by and watch. Because of these new drug policies, the Kelowna mayor says that police cannot stop drug users from getting high and leaving syringes in children's playgrounds.
Our Prime Minister is out of touch and our streets are out of control. When are the Liberals going to take public safety seriously?
Mr. Speaker, the toxic drug and overdose crisis continues to take a tragic toll on families, loved ones and communities.
Our government will use every tool at our disposal to work with our partners to end this national public health tragedy. Since 2017, we have committed more than $1 billion to address the overdose crisis, and we are taking concrete steps to divert people who use drugs away from the criminal justice system. Approving B.C.'s decriminalization proposal for personal possession is an important step. So far, we have supported 31 projects, providing a safer supply.
Mr. Speaker, it is unbelievable that the Liberals think it is acceptable for open drug use where children play.
The answer from the minister is completely out of touch with reality, and the reality is that the drug policies of the Liberal-NDP coalition are making our streets and parks less safe for families. Now municipalities across British Columbia, from Kelowna to Campbell River, are having to take action through bylaws and provincial advocacy, just to keep their communities safe.
Again I will ask, when will the Liberals take public safety seriously?
Mr. Speaker, we are committed to ending the toxic drug and overdose crisis.
In moving forward on decriminalization, there is adequate supervision by the B.C. government and the B.C. Centre on Substance Use on both public safety and public health, with proper indicators. We are monitoring this very closely, but we have to stop this toxic drug overdose tragedy. We will do that.
[Translation]
Public Safety
Mr. Speaker, last week, the Minister of Public Safety—yes, him again— told a parliamentary committee that the illegal Chinese police stations in Montreal and Brossard had been shut down.
The problem with what the minister said is that it is not true. Those police stations are still operating. The heads of the two Chinese police stations say that they did not receive any closure requests from the RCMP and that they are continuing to operate normally.
The Liberals are obviously not taking the matter of Chinese interference seriously. This is a serious problem, a very serious problem.
Can the Prime Minister tell us the truth and confirm that the Minister of Public Safety misled the House?
Mr. Speaker, as I explained to my colleague, the RCMP has taken decisive action to deal with the so-called Chinese police stations. The RCMP will continue to monitor whether there are others. I hope that all members expect the RCMP to remain vigilant on this issue.
More importantly, budget 2023 allocates $49 million to deal with this matter. I hope that my colleague and all Conservatives will support the budget.
Innovation, Science and Industry
Mr. Speaker, it is essential we support scientists and researchers across Canada so we can position ourselves as a global leader in the research ecosystem.
Can the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry talk about the recent announcement made through the first research excellence fund and how this funding will support important research initiatives with universities across the country?
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Châteauguay—Lacolle for her important question and her excellent work as a colleague.
In fact, I was at Concordia University on Friday to announce an historic investment of $1.4 billion in the sciences. Our students, our researchers and our scientists play a vital role. I think that all of my colleagues agree. This funding will support wide-scale research initiatives across the country, from Vancouver to Calgary, to Montreal and obviously Halifax. We will—
[English]
Housing
Mr. Speaker, CMHC is reporting that Canada could see a reduction of almost 32% in new housing construction this year. Its chief economist said that, with record inflation, sky-high interest rates and labour shortages, the current economic situation is “inhospitable” for new construction.
The warnings are coming from inside the castle walls now. I am wondering when this government will actually clean up the fiscal mess it created so Canadians can one day afford a home again.
Mr. Speaker, I wish the hon. member, in good conscience, would speak to his colleague from Sarnia—Lambton, who stood in this House and voted against the housing accelerator fund after praising it in committee and praising it in the House of Commons. This is the problem with that party. The Conservatives have no policies when it comes to actually delivering housing affordability and a housing supply for Canadians. The member's colleague from Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon went further and said that the federal government should withdraw from housing investments and leave everything to the provinces and the market, and somehow it will magically be okay.
Canadians expect better from the official opposition.
Mr. Speaker, I can assure members that when we replace the Liberals as the government, we will deliver better. We will not waste taxpayers' money so egregiously to achieve nothing for results. Under the Liberals, local politicians are delaying and even blocking new housing. Saskatoon guarantees a building permit for a house in five days. It can be done. There is no reason for the delay.
When will the government finally stand up to local politicians who are creating costly delays, so we can get the homes built that Canadians so desperately need?
Mr. Speaker, we know that the key to building more housing supply is to work with provinces and municipalities. The Conservatives do not understand that. In fact, their leader, this morning in this chamber, denigrated and attacked three of the mayors of Canada's largest cities. That is not going to build one unit of housing for the most vulnerable in this country.
What we have done is bring real solutions, including the housing accelerator fund, which will double the number of new homes built in Canada. Instead of supporting that and getting serious about this issue, the Conservatives offer gimmicks and buzzwords.
Carbon Pricing
Mr. Speaker, I grew up in the small forestry town of Nackawic, New Brunswick, which also happens to be the home of the world's largest axe. At the rate this government is increasing taxes, including a 41¢-per-litre hike on Canadians' heating, eating and meeting, we might need an even bigger axe to slay all of these back-breaking taxes.
Will the Prime Minister, who is out of touch, take his boot off the backs of hard-working Canadians who are out of money and finally axe this failed, ineffective and punitive carbon tax?
Mr. Speaker, I would ask my hon. colleague to work with me; it is going to be a bit difficult to follow. In 2006, the Conservative Party was against carbon pricing. Then, in 2008, the Conservatives were in favour of carbon pricing. Then, in 2009, they were against the fact that they were in favour of carbon pricing. That changed again in 2011, and it changed again during the last election campaign, when the Conservative Party of Canada campaigned in favour of having carbon pricing, and now they are against it.
If we give it another year or so, they will be back in favour of carbon pricing.
Health
Mr. Speaker, three years ago, 22 people were killed in Nova Scotia in what was the worst mass shooting in Canadian history. The victims were friends, families and neighbours, and all Nova Scotians were touched by this tragedy.
Last week, our government announced funding, in partnership with the Province of Nova Scotia, dedicated specifically for mental health support for those who were impacted. Can the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions update this House on how that will support those who have been impacted by this terrible tragedy?
Mr. Speaker, our hearts go out to all the people of Nova Scotia so affected by this tragedy. I want to thank the member for Kings—Hants for his work to support all of those impacted.
Our government is investing an initial $9 million, along with $9 million from the Nova Scotia government, to design and deliver mental health, grief and bereavement services in Cumberland, Colchester and Hants counties, as recommended in the Mass Casualty Commission's final report. We will also continue to work with community organizations to ensure that the appropriate supports are available for all Nova Scotians.
Indigenous Affairs
Mr. Speaker, part of my riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith is on the traditional territories of the Snuneymuxw First Nation.
Snuneymuxw entered into a treaty in 1854, yet this agreement has not been upheld. The government has committed to transfer land where the former Nanaimo Indian Hospital stood to Snuneymuxw, but continues to delay despite being aware of the potential presence of unmarked graves at this site. It is shameful.
Will the government finally transfer this land to Snuneymuxw so they can move forward as they see fit to ensure justice and healing can begin?
Mr. Speaker, I did have the opportunity, a few months ago, to sit down with the leadership of Snuneymuxw First Nation to discuss this specific issue. I believe we are quite close on a resolution that would confirm the member opposite's question.
I would be glad to sit down with her but even more glad to conclude this in the right way. It has been a long time coming.
Climate Change
Mr. Speaker, the late great Gordon Lightfoot sang “Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings” in his song The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a tribute to the Great Lakes and their power.
Our Great Lakes are a Canadian treasure, but from climate change to toxic waste pollution these lakes are increasingly under threat. Millions of people and several ecosystems are dependent on the largest concentration of fresh water in the world, yet, to our embarrassment, the government has not matched the U.S. in respecting our Great Lakes.
While many great organizations are engaged in their protection, why is the Liberal government still refusing to show leadership on protecting our Great Lakes?
Mr. Speaker, it is quite the opposite. The last budget from my friend and colleague, the Minister of Finance, made provisions for record-level investment in the Great Lakes in the history of Canada.
We are working with our partners across the Great Lakes on this side of the border as well as on the other side of the border. We are in the process of creating, for the first time ever in Canada, an independent Canada water agency that will help us address freshwater issues all across the country.
Gordon Lightfoot
Violence Against Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-Spirit People
Mr. Speaker, there have been consultations, and I hope that if you seek it, you will find consent for the following motion.
I move:
That, given that:
(i) on October 27, 2022, the House unanimously recognized that what happened in residential schools was genocide,
(ii) decades of insufficient action from all levels of government have failed to address the effects of this genocide, including the crisis of violence against indigenous women, girls, and two-spirit people with the urgency it deserves,
(iii) families in Winnipeg and throughout the country continue to experience the tragic loss of loved ones to this crisis,
the House call on the government to:
(a) declare the continued loss of indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people a Canada-wide emergency; and
(b) provide immediate and substantial investment, including in a red dress alert system, to help alert the public when an indigenous woman, girl or two-spirit person goes missing.
Government Orders
[Government Orders]
[Translation]
Budget Implementation Act, 2023, No. 1
The House resumed from May 1, consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 28, 2023, be read the second time and referred to a committee, and of the amendment.
It being 3:15 p.m., pursuant to order made on Thursday, June 23, 2022, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the amendment of the hon. member for Louis-Saint-Laurent to the motion for second reading of Bill C‑31.
[English]
Call in the members.
And the bells having rung:
[Translation]
(The House divided on the amendment, which was negatived on the following division:)
(Division No. 307)
YEAS
Members
AboultaifAitchison
Albas
Allison
Arnold
Baldinelli
Barlow
Barrett
Berthold
Bezan
Block
Bragdon
Brassard
Brock
Calkins
Caputo
Carrie
Chambers
Chong
Cooper
Dalton
Dancho
Davidson
Deltell
d'Entremont
Doherty
Dowdall
Dreeshen
Duncan (Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry)
Ellis
Epp
Falk (Battlefords—Lloydminster)
Falk (Provencher)
Fast
Ferreri
Findlay
Gallant
Généreux
Genuis
Gladu
Godin
Goodridge
Gourde
Gray
Hallan
Hoback
Jeneroux
Kelly
Kitchen
Kmiec
Kram
Kramp-Neuman
Kurek
Kusie
Lake
Lantsman
Lawrence
Lehoux
Lewis (Essex)
Lewis (Haldimand—Norfolk)
Liepert
Lloyd
Lobb
Maguire
Martel
Mazier
McCauley (Edmonton West)
McLean
Melillo
Moore
Morantz
Morrison
Motz
Muys
Nater
O'Toole
Patzer
Paul-Hus
Perkins
Poilievre
Redekopp
Reid
Rempel Garner
Richards
Roberts
Rood
Ruff
Scheer
Schmale
Seeback
Shields
Shipley
Small
Soroka
Steinley
Stewart
Strahl
Stubbs
Thomas
Tochor
Tolmie
Uppal
Van Popta
Vecchio
Vidal
Vien
Viersen
Vis
Vuong
Wagantall
Warkentin
Waugh
Webber
Williams
Williamson
Zimmer
Total: -- 116
NAYS
Members
AldagAlghabra
Ali
Anand
Anandasangaree
Angus
Arseneault
Arya
Ashton
Atwin
Bachrach
Badawey
Bains
Baker
Barron
Barsalou-Duval
Battiste
Beaulieu
Beech
Bendayan
Bennett
Bergeron
Bérubé
Bibeau
Bittle
Blaikie
Blair
Blanchet
Blanchette-Joncas
Blaney
Blois
Boissonnault
Boulerice
Bradford
Brière
Brunelle-Duceppe
Cannings
Casey
Chabot
Chagger
Chahal
Champagne
Champoux
Chatel
Chen
Chiang
Collins (Hamilton East—Stoney Creek)
Collins (Victoria)
Cormier
Coteau
Dabrusin
Damoff
Davies
DeBellefeuille
Desbiens
Desilets
Desjarlais
Dhaliwal
Dhillon
Diab
Dong
Drouin
Dubourg
Duclos
Duguid
Dzerowicz
Ehsassi
El-Khoury
Erskine-Smith
Fergus
Fillmore
Fisher
Fonseca
Fortier
Fortin
Fragiskatos
Fraser
Fry
Gaheer
Garon
Garrison
Gaudreau
Gazan
Gerretsen
Gill
Gould
Green
Guilbeault
Hajdu
Hanley
Hardie
Hepfner
Holland
Housefather
Hughes
Hussen
Hutchings
Iacono
Idlout
Ien
Jaczek
Johns
Jowhari
Julian
Kayabaga
Kelloway
Khalid
Khera
Koutrakis
Kusmierczyk
Kwan
Lalonde
Lambropoulos
Lametti
Lamoureux
Lapointe
Larouche
Lattanzio
Lauzon
LeBlanc
Lebouthillier
Lemire
Lightbound
Long
Longfield
Louis (Kitchener—Conestoga)
MacAulay (Cardigan)
MacDonald (Malpeque)
MacGregor
MacKinnon (Gatineau)
Maloney
Martinez Ferrada
Masse
Mathyssen
May (Cambridge)
May (Saanich—Gulf Islands)
McDonald (Avalon)
McGuinty
McKay
McKinnon (Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam)
McLeod
McPherson
Mendès
Mendicino
Miao
Michaud
Miller
Morrice
Morrissey
Murray
Naqvi
Noormohamed
Normandin
O'Connell
Oliphant
O'Regan
Pauzé
Perron
Petitpas Taylor
Plamondon
Qualtrough
Rayes
Robillard
Rodriguez
Rogers
Romanado
Sahota
Sajjan
Saks
Samson
Sarai
Savard-Tremblay
Scarpaleggia
Schiefke
Serré
Sgro
Shanahan
Sheehan
Sidhu (Brampton East)
Sidhu (Brampton South)
Simard
Sinclair-Desgagné
Singh
Sorbara
Sousa
Ste-Marie
St-Onge
Sudds
Tassi
Taylor Roy
Thériault
Therrien
Thompson
Trudeau
Trudel
Turnbull
Valdez
Van Bynen
van Koeverden
Vandal
Vandenbeld
Vignola
Villemure
Virani
Weiler
Wilkinson
Yip
Zahid
Zarrillo
Zuberi
Total: -- 210
PAIRED
Nil
I declare the amendment lost.
The next question is on the main motion.
[English]
If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division or wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
(Division No. 308)
YEAS
Members
AldagAlghabra
Ali
Anand
Anandasangaree
Angus
Arseneault
Arya
Ashton
Atwin
Bachrach
Badawey
Bains
Baker
Barron
Battiste
Beech
Bendayan
Bennett
Bibeau
Bittle
Blaikie
Blair
Blaney
Blois
Boissonnault
Boulerice
Bradford
Brière
Cannings
Casey
Chagger
Chahal
Champagne
Chatel
Chen
Chiang
Collins (Hamilton East—Stoney Creek)
Collins (Victoria)
Cormier
Coteau
Dabrusin
Damoff
Davies
Desjarlais
Dhaliwal
Dhillon
Diab
Dong
Drouin
Dubourg
Duclos
Duguid
Dzerowicz
Ehsassi
El-Khoury
Erskine-Smith
Fergus
Fillmore
Fisher
Fonseca
Fortier
Fragiskatos
Fraser
Fry
Gaheer
Garrison
Gazan
Gerretsen
Gould
Green
Guilbeault
Hajdu
Hanley
Hardie
Hepfner
Holland
Housefather
Hughes
Hussen
Hutchings
Iacono
Idlout
Ien
Jaczek
Johns
Jowhari
Julian
Kayabaga
Kelloway
Khalid
Khera
Koutrakis
Kusmierczyk
Kwan
Lalonde
Lambropoulos
Lametti
Lamoureux
Lapointe
Lattanzio
Lauzon
LeBlanc
Lebouthillier
Lightbound
Long
Longfield
Louis (Kitchener—Conestoga)
MacAulay (Cardigan)
MacDonald (Malpeque)
MacGregor
MacKinnon (Gatineau)
Maloney
Martinez Ferrada
Masse
Mathyssen
May (Cambridge)
May (Saanich—Gulf Islands)
McDonald (Avalon)
McGuinty
McKay
McKinnon (Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam)
McLeod
McPherson
Mendès
Mendicino
Miao
Miller
Morrice
Morrissey
Murray
Naqvi
Noormohamed
O'Connell
Oliphant
O'Regan
Petitpas Taylor
Qualtrough
Robillard
Rodriguez
Rogers
Romanado
Sahota
Sajjan
Saks
Samson
Sarai
Scarpaleggia
Schiefke
Serré
Sgro
Shanahan
Sheehan
Sidhu (Brampton East)
Sidhu (Brampton South)
Singh
Sorbara
Sousa
St-Onge
Sudds
Tassi
Taylor Roy
Thompson
Trudeau
Turnbull
Valdez
Van Bynen
van Koeverden
Vandal
Vandenbeld
Virani
Weiler
Wilkinson
Yip
Zahid
Zarrillo
Zuberi
Total: -- 177
NAYS
Members
AboultaifAitchison
Albas
Allison
Arnold
Baldinelli
Barlow
Barrett
Barsalou-Duval
Beaulieu
Bergeron
Berthold
Bérubé
Bezan
Blanchet
Blanchette-Joncas
Block
Bragdon
Brassard
Brock
Brunelle-Duceppe
Calkins
Caputo
Carrie
Chabot
Chambers
Champoux
Chong
Cooper
Dalton
Dancho
Davidson
DeBellefeuille
Deltell
d'Entremont
Desbiens
Desilets
Doherty
Dowdall
Dreeshen
Duncan (Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry)
Ellis
Epp
Falk (Battlefords—Lloydminster)
Falk (Provencher)
Fast
Ferreri
Findlay
Fortin
Gallant
Garon
Gaudreau
Généreux
Genuis
Gill
Gladu
Godin
Goodridge
Gourde
Gray
Hallan
Hoback
Jeneroux
Kelly
Kitchen
Kmiec
Kram
Kramp-Neuman
Kurek
Kusie
Lake
Lantsman
Larouche
Lawrence
Lehoux
Lemire
Lewis (Essex)
Lewis (Haldimand—Norfolk)
Liepert
Lloyd
Lobb
Maguire
Martel
Mazier
McCauley (Edmonton West)
McLean
Melillo
Michaud
Moore
Morantz
Morrison
Motz
Muys
Nater
Normandin
O'Toole
Patzer
Paul-Hus
Pauzé
Perkins
Perron
Plamondon
Poilievre
Rayes
Redekopp
Reid
Rempel Garner
Richards
Roberts
Rood
Ruff
Savard-Tremblay
Scheer
Schmale
Seeback
Shields
Shipley
Simard
Sinclair-Desgagné
Small
Soroka
Steinley
Ste-Marie
Stewart
Strahl
Stubbs
Thériault
Therrien
Thomas
Tochor
Tolmie
Trudel
Uppal
Van Popta
Vecchio
Vidal
Vien
Viersen
Vignola
Villemure
Vis
Vuong
Wagantall
Warkentin
Waugh
Webber
Williams
Williamson
Zimmer
Total: -- 149
PAIRED
Nil
I declare the motion carried. Accordingly, the bill stands referred to the Standing Committee on Finance.
(Bill read the second time and referred to a committee)
Privilege
Foreign Interference and Alleged Intimidation of Member
[Privilege]
Mr. Speaker, I am rising on a question of privilege, further to the notice that I gave earlier today concerning revelations published in The Globe and Mail yesterday. These concern efforts by a diplomat of the People's Republic of China, accredited by the Government of Canada, to target me and my family as a consequence of my February 22, 2021 vote on the Conservative opposition day motion, which I moved, condemning the government of the People's Republic of China and its treatment of the Uyghur minority as a genocide.
House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, states, at pages 107 to 108, “In order to fulfill their parliamentary duties, Members should be able to go about their parliamentary business undisturbed.... Any form of intimidation of a Member with respect to the Member’s actions during a proceeding in Parliament could amount to contempt.” This is long-standing and well-established procedure and principle of the law of parliamentary privilege, tracing its roots back to an April 12, 1733 resolution of the British House of Commons, which states, “That the assaulting, insulting, or menacing of any member of this House in his coming to or going from the House or upon the account of his behaviour in Parliament is a high infringement of the privilege of this House, a most outrageous and dangerous violation of the rights of Parliament and an high crime and misdemeanour.”
To be clear, this privilege is not being asserted, nor do I assert it today, against any Canadian who exercises his or her fundamental democratic right to enter into political debate and criticize elected members of the House for the stands they take. Joseph Maingot, at page 235 of Parliamentary Privilege in Canada, second edition, articulates the appropriate balance between free debate and intimidation and coercion. He states:
All interferences with Members' privileges of freedom of speech, such as editorials and other public comment, are not breaches of privilege, even though they influence the conduct of Members in their parliamentary work. Accordingly, not every action by an outside body that may influence the conduct of a Member of Parliament as such could now be regarded as a breach of privilege, even if it were calculated and intended to bring pressure on the Member to take or to refrain from taking a particular course. But any attempt by improper means to influence or obstruct a Member in his parliamentary work may constitute contempt. What constitutes an improper means of interfering with Members' parliamentary work is always a question depending on the facts of each case.
Here are the facts of the present case. Yesterday's Globe and Mail reported that the government of the People's Republic of China “sees Canada as a ‘high-priority target’ and employs ‘incentives and punishment’ as part of a vast influence network directed at legislators, business executives and diaspora communities in this country, according to a top secret intelligence assessment from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service”. Later on in the report, Robert Fife and Steven Chase write:
The report, People's Republic of China Foreign Interference in Canada: A Critical National Security Threat, lists several examples of Chinese influence operations aimed at the opposition Conservative Party.
It says CSIS reporting from 2021 indicates that China's intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security (MSS), ‘has taken specific actions to target Canadian MPs’ who are linked to the February 2021 parliamentary motion condemning Beijing's oppression of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities. The motion, which passed, declared China's conduct to amount to genocide.
The spy agency said an MSS officer sought information on an unnamed Canadian MP's relatives ‘who may be located in the PRC, for further potential sanctions.’ This effort, the CSIS report said, ‘is almost certainly meant to make an example of this MP and deter others from taking anti-PRC positions.’
A national-security source, whom the Globe is not naming because they risk prosecution under the Security of Information Act, said the MP targeted was Conservative MP [my name] and that Zhao Wei, a Chinese diplomat in Canada, was working on this matter.
The motion in question was a Conservative motion that I introduced and moved in the House and that was adopted on February 22, 2021. Despite knowing about this intimidation operation involving a diplomat approved by the Government of Canada for two years, the government did not inform me that a diplomat was targeting my family, nor did the government take any action to expel the diplomat responsible for orchestrating this intimidation campaign. In fact, Mr. Wei Zhao continues to have the government's authorization to be and work in Canada with immunity, on behalf of Beijing's government. Frankly, I think this demonstrates a complete lack of common decency and leadership. Indeed, not a single Beijing diplomat has been expelled by the government since the news of Beijing's foreign interference threat activities started to be reported a couple of years ago. Nonetheless, the fact remains that this intimidation operation was launched and was in direct consequence of my motion in the House concerning the treatment of Uyghurs. These are the facts.
Bosc and Gagnon, at page 109, observe that, “In order to find a prima facie breach of privilege, the Speaker must be satisfied that there is evidence to support the Member’s claim that he or she has been impeded in the performance of his or her parliamentary functions and that the matter is directly related to a proceeding in Parliament.” A “proceeding in Parliament” is a technical term for which Bosc and Gagnon, at page 90, refer to two definitions, one from the United Kingdom's Erskine May and the other from Australia's Parliamentary Privileges Act, 1987.
May's definition, taken from page 235 of the 24th edition of A Treatise on the Law, Privileges, Proceedings and Usage of Parliament, states that “An individual Member takes part in a proceeding usually by speech, but also by various recognised forms of formal action, such as voting, giving notice of a motion, or presenting a petition or report from a committee, most of such actions being time-saving substitutes for speaking.” The Australian statutory definition, meanwhile, contains the expression “all words spoken and acts done in the course of, or for purposes of or incidental to, the transacting of the business of a House or of a committee”.
A long line of precedents affirm the right of members to go about their parliamentary duties free of intimidation. Speaker Lamoureux, on September 19, 1973, said, at page 6709 of the Debates, that he had “no hesitation in reaffirming the principle that parliamentary privilege includes the right of a member to discharge his responsibilities as a member of the House free from threats or attempts at intimidation.” On May 1, 1986, Speaker Bosley held, at page 12847 of the Debates, “If an Hon. Member is impeded or obstructed in the performance of his or her parliamentary duties through threats, intimidation, bribery attempts or other improper behaviour, such a case would fall within the limits of parliamentary privilege.” Subsequently, Speaker Parent, on March 24, 1994, commented, at page 2706 of the Debates, “Threats of blackmail or intimidation of a member of Parliament should never be taken lightly. When such occurs, the very essence of free speech is undermined. Without the guarantee of freedom of speech, no member of Parliament can do his duty as is expected.”
More recently, on March 6, 2012, a prima facie contempt was found, arising from an intimidation campaign of YouTube videos from the Internet, by hacking collective Anonymous, largely targeting a former colleague and his family members as a consequence of legislation this colleague tabled in the House. In so ruling, the Speaker said, at page 5834 of the Debates:
Those who enter political life fully expect to be able to be held accountable for their actions to their constituents and to those who are concerned with the issues and initiatives they may advocate.
In a healthy democracy, vigorous debate on issues is encouraged. In fact, the rules and procedures of this House are drafted to allow for proponents and opponents to discuss, in a respectful manner, even the most difficult and sensitive of matters.
However, when duly elected members are personally threatened for their work in Parliament, whether introducing a bill, making a statement or casting a vote, this House must take the matter very seriously.
I would echo those words, “this House must take the matter very seriously.”
While I am speaking of my own situation today, I am far from alone in experiencing Beijing's foreign interference threat activities. Debates inside and outside of this House since November have been dominated by a succession of breathtaking disclosures from our national security experts, revealed by multiple media outlets. These have shown a concerted and organized campaign by Beijing's Communist government to manipulate Canadian politics and the proceedings of this House in favour of that government's positions. Equally concerning has been the Canadian government's failure to do anything to curb it.
The latest report in The Globe and Mail demonstrates that this scourge of foreign interference threat activities directed at members of this House is not limited to elections, party nominations or diaspora communities. This nefarious campaign's reach into parliamentary proceedings is a new fact, but it is one that we should not be too surprised about.
Just as it is a novel concern in this recently surfaced story, which is still unravelling, and for this House generally to consider interference and intimidation by foreign state actors, that is not a procedural impediment to the Speaker finding a prima facie case of contempt here. On this particular point, Bosc and Gagnon comment, at page 81:
The House of Commons enjoys very wide latitude in maintaining its dignity and authority through the exercise of its contempt power. In other words, the House may consider any misconduct to be contempt and may deal with it accordingly.... This area of parliamentary law is therefore extremely fluid and most valuable for the Commons to be able to meet novel situations.
They add, at page 112:
It is impossible to codify all incidents which might be interpreted as matters of obstruction, interference, molestation or intimidation and, as such, constitute prima facie cases of privilege.
Before closing, I would like to add one final point. Our authorities refer to the need for questions of privilege to be raised at the earliest opportunity in the House. While the Globe and Mail report was published yesterday morning, this afternoon is the first opportunity I have had to raise this point of privilege. In fact, this afternoon is the first time I have been up in the House since the report was published in The Globe and Mail.
In addition, I had to reflect on, and seek counsel about, the best way to move forward regarding these concerns, as the Speaker is aware. In addition, I confirmed the serious, grave details in The Globe and Mail report, including that an individual in Canada, Mr. Wei Zhao, who is accredited by the Government of Canada, was involved in conducting these intimidation operations.
I trust that, under the circumstances, the Speaker would not impose the narrowest possible interpretation to “the earliest opportunity to raise this in the House” so as to deny me the opportunity to raise this very important matter of foreign intimidation operations directed at elected members of Parliament. That is because it has become even clearer in the last 24 hours that members of Parliament, certainly opposition members, and Canadians at large cannot rely upon the Government of Canada, the executive branch of our system, to discharge its role as the defender of the realm.
That is why Parliament, and this House in particular, must vindicate its own authority and protect our interests and those of the members of this place when those interests are under threat, as we now see them to be.
Mr. Speaker, I plead to you to see that it now falls to you, as the guardian of our rights and privileges, to send a clear and unambiguous signal that this sort of conduct on the part of the People's Republic of China is simply unacceptable. Should you agree, Mr. Speaker, I would be prepared to move the appropriate motion at the appropriate time.
I want to thank the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills, and I will return with a ruling as soon as possible.
The hon. parliamentary secretary to the government House leader is rising on the same point of order.
Mr. Speaker, as the government has clearly indicated, any form of foreign interference or intimidation is completely unacceptable. I will reserve the opportunity to return to you or your offices as to whether there is going to be any further comment coming from the government.
Mr. Speaker, I feel very sad that this has happened to the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. This is shocking. I think all of us in the House are shocked, and I think we can all agree that this is something that, while affecting one member of this House, also affects many Chinese Canadian citizens across the country. This has been raised time and time again. We would like to come forward with further discussion and debate on this at a later date.
[Translation]
Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, I pledge our wholehearted support for our colleague and his family, who are currently going through a very difficult situation. I believe that all members of the House must support our colleague. The Bloc Québécois will be doing so. I believe that is what each and every one of us would want to see if we were in his position. He can count on our support. We will be there to debate with him. We must get to the bottom of this.
[English]
Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to say just a few words, not many. In case Canadians watching this do not know the quality and the integrity of the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills, I want to attest to it here in a non-partisan fashion. This is an exemplary member of Parliament. It is an outrage that any foreign government would target him and his family. I have had the honour of serving here for exactly 12 years today from when I was elected; since then, I have known no finer parliamentarian than the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
For any member to be treated in this way is offensive. Partisanship obviously happens here, but in a non-partisan way, I want to attest to the integrity, character and extraordinary ethical framework of that member and ask that his concerns be addressed with diligence.
Business of Supply
Opposition Motion—Home Ownership and Renting Affordability
[Business of Supply]
The House resumed consideration of the motion.
Mr. Speaker, it is great to get back to what we are talking about today, which, of course, is the opposition day motion.
I am going to take a moment to recognize Beatrice Weaver. Beatrice lives in Elmsdale, Nova Scotia, and this past weekend, she turned 109 years old. I had the opportunity to visit Beatrice. While recognizing and celebrating her birthday, I promised her that I would make sure her name and her accomplishment of reaching 109 are in Hansard forever. She is still spry. I am going to have this clip recorded and make sure she and her family can see it. Congratulations to Beatrice. I hear some colleagues clapping.
To go back to the matter before us right now, the opposition day motion, I actually agree with provision (b) in the fact that any time we can align all three governments with regard to investment and line this up with residential development, that makes a lot of smart public policy sense.
I was surprised to see the motion include these words: “so that young and middle-class people don't need to use cars”. I know the Conservatives have been against the government's effort to help renew the Canadian auto sector. The leader of the official opposition spoke against the partnership with Volkswagen to create 3,000 jobs in St. Thomas. However, I was surprised they did not say something along the lines of the following: “so that individuals can more easily access public transit”. I thought that the fact that they talked about not using cars was a little off brand for the official opposition, and I was quite surprised to see it. I want to make sure that it is there.
I also agree with provision (c); in principle, there is merit in being able to use federal resources, in terms of surplus lands. I would note that any time the government can create a more efficient process to deem federal lands surplus, where appropriate, it makes a lot of public policy sense. The lands could then be used for the type of purpose the motion talks about, which is affordable housing.
As I have said from the outset, for the benefit of my colleagues who were not here for my remarks before question period, there are merits in this motion that are, frankly, good public policy. There are other areas where I think there are real, considerable gaps. One of these is how to constitute what a reasonable delay is and whether we should be punishing Canadians who live in municipalities that, according to the official opposition, are not necessarily meeting the outcomes that they are arbitrarily putting in place.
I want to talk about one element that was not included in the motion, and that is skilled trades and access to labour. I have before me a CTV article from Talisman Gate, a housing project in the Gravenhurst area in the riding of Parry Sound—Muskoka, which is that of the shadow minister for the Conservative Party. There is no mention whatsoever about access to labour. Developers talk about the challenge they have, which is that they are finding it more and more difficult to find the people who are able to build the housing.
I can appreciate the hon. member raising this concern around how we can expedite processes. I have some legitimate concerns about the simplification and how they framed this in the opposition day motion. It does not talk about having the men and women to build the houses. This particular project in Gravenhurst has been delayed by over a year because the developer was struggling to find the available labour. Why would the member not have included that? That is a really important point that could have helped round out this dynamic.
I will summarize my remarks by saying that there are elements within this opposition day motion that have merit. I thank the hon. member for Parry Sound—Muskoka, because I think he is better than others at public policy framing in terms of what he can accomplish. I said earlier in my remarks that it is too bad he did not win the leadership. I think the opposition party would have been in better hands, although this is not to create grenades on that side. However, there are some real issues, particularly around what constitutes a reasonable delay and how we would go about even establishing rewarding municipalities that are doing good work on developing and building housing. There are not a whole lot of answers there. There are a lot of problems identified and simplistic solutions, but there is not a whole lot of nuanced public policy that is going to solve the issue.
Madam Speaker, I was not planning on asking a question, but I will tell the member how the town of Gravenhurst is pronounced.
Many times in this House I have talked about the importance of the federal immigration system working directly with the provinces to make sure we are attracting the right skills to build the homes Canadians need. I wonder if he can speak to that. Are we actually doing enough to attract skilled trades to this country?
Madam Speaker, my apologies to the good people of the Gravenhurst community in the member opposite's riding.
The point remains that I wish that was something the party opposite had put in the motion today.
The Minister of Immigration is developing skilled pathways that are specific to regional outcomes, whereby the provinces are able to identify gaps in particular types of labour positions. They can help identify ways we can create skilled pathways for immigrants who might want to come here and bring their trades and the opportunities to build the housing the member talks about. Also, the government is putting a lot of investment in working with provinces, institutions, universities and the skilled trades to get the folks who have the skills to build the houses we need.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, it will come as no surprise to anyone that the Quebec government wants full powers over immigration. Part of the housing crisis can be attributed to the fact that the construction of new housing has not kept up with population growth.
Can my colleague not face the facts and recognize that it would be more efficient and more productive to give Quebec full control over its immigration and, at the same time, that it makes sense to transfer the money to Quebec so that it can plan its supply of new housing for the long term, taking immigration into account, if only to ensure that the housing crisis does not get worse?
Since 2016, we should have had 100,000 more new homes than we do now.
Does my colleague not realize that the Liberal national housing strategy is a complete failure and that there are human consequences to that?
[English]
Madam Speaker, as I understand it, there are already significant devolved and delegated powers for the Government of Quebec in relation to selecting the immigrants who come to Quebec. Our government has been very clear regarding our desire to increase, on the federal side, the amount of immigration that is francophone-based. We know that is extremely important from a linguistic perspective, not only across the country but indeed in Quebec as well. Therefore, I think there is already a lot of devolved power going to the Legault government, the Quebec government, to help it choose. We are working on a regional basis as well to make that happen.
I think there are a lot of good existing programs. If the member has concerns about the immigration pathways in Quebec, he should raise that with the Quebec government, which has significant power to choose the immigrants in question.
Madam Speaker, part of the immigration problem is that the government has decided to continue to use temporary foreign workers to address our skilled labour shortage, including in the construction sector. What the government should do is regularize people so they have the status to come to Canada, and ensure that those who are already in Canada have full status.
Would the member support the regularization of those without status or those with temporary status who are already in Canada so they can fully contribute to every aspect of Canada's development?
Madam Speaker, I am glad my remarks at the end of the intervention have bled into a really important conversation about immigration. Of course, I will remind listeners at home that this is about housing, but I agree that we have to help folks who want to come to Canada to make a difference.
My view, given my local experience in Kings—Hants, where we welcome almost 2,000 seasonal agriculture workers, is perhaps a bit different from the member opposite's. It is not that I do not support long-term access to pathways for citizenship in this country. I absolutely do. However, if we talk to some of the workers, they do not want to come to Canada and become full-time citizens. They find that the opportunity—
—to contribute to their family at home is one of the best foreign development programs.
The member opposite can try to scream me down in the House, but if she wants to hear my answer, it is simply, yes, absolutely we should regularize the opportunity for folks who want to come to Canada so they can. For those who do not want to, let us make sure there are protections in place to allow their valuable contributions to our country and the ability for them to help support their families at home.
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to stand in this venerable House to speak on behalf of my residents of the riding I am very proud to represent, which is Davenport, and to speak to the Conservative opposition day motion on inflation and housing.
My remarks are going to cover three key areas. The first is the issue of inflation and housing and how it is impacting Davenport residents. The second is what our federal government is doing. The third will be the problems that I see with some of the key statements proposed in the opposition day motion. Unfortunately, I will not be supporting it.
The first thing I want to talk about is how inflation and housing costs are impacting Davenport residents.
I had the wonderful pleasure of being able to canvass on a rainy Saturday afternoon just recently, and I had a chance to speak to about 100 Davenport residents. I will tell members that the three issues that were top of mind for them were the cost of living, whether they will be able to live in Toronto and whether their kids or grandkids will be able to buy homes, which many were worried about.
We spoke at length at the doors, and I talked to them about all of the things we were doing at the national level. I prefaced my conversation with them by saying that for over 30 years, all three levels of government in the city of Toronto spent very little money on supporting housing affordability and creating affordable housing. Thirty years of non-investment has a huge impact.
I said to them that I have a lot of confidence that within the next few years, all three levels of government will be working really hard to address the issue. I do not agree with all of the decisions at the provincial level, but we are all seized with the issue of housing affordability and affordable housing, and we are working very hard to try to resolve the issue. I have a lot of confidence that our kids and grandkids will see houses they can buy and can afford to buy, that we will be creating more rental spaces and that we will be creating more spaces for the most vulnerable in our communities.
This leads me to my second section, which is about what we have done on housing.
I am very proud of our government. Since we came here in late 2015, we have really taken charge of housing and the issues around housing and how to build more housing in this country. I will talk to a few aspects of that, because I think it is important for people to be reminded of what we have done.
We have introduced a national housing strategy, and we have allocated more than $72 billion. We have put in a number of measures that will help individuals who are looking to save money to buy their homes. We have recently introduced a new tax-free home savings account to allow Canadians to save up to $40,000 tax-free to buy their first home. We have also doubled the first-time homebuyers' tax credit to provide up to $1,500 in direct support to homebuyers to offset closing costs involved in buying a new home.
We have introduced a whole series of measures to make sure the houses we have here in Canada are for Canadians, and to do what we can to curb speculation, which is driving our housing prices up, particularly in our major cities. I have a couple of things to mention there.
We have the two-year ban on non-resident, non-Canadian purchases of residential property to help curb speculation and ensure that houses are used as homes for Canadians to live in. We have introduced a 1% annual underused housing tax on the value of non-resident, non-Canadian-owned residential properties that are vacant or underused. We are also making sure that the profits from the flipping of properties held for less than 12 months are taxed fully and fairly.
These measures will go a long way to ensuring that the houses we have are being kept for Canadians and that we are doing what we can to curb speculation.
We have launched a $4-billion housing accelerator fund to remove barriers and to incentivize housing supply growth, with the goal of creating at least 100,000 net new homes across Canada. We have also launched a $200-million stream under the affordable housing innovation fund to develop and scale up rent-to-own projects, which I know is something that Davenport residents are very happy about. They like their apartments and are looking for opportunities to rent them. This program would allow them to actually own them one day. We have also launched a third round of the rapid housing initiative, which will provide $1.5 billion to create 4,500 new affordable housing units for Canadians in severe housing need.
In my riding, we have some of these rapid housing initiatives. They have been life-saving for the most vulnerable in our community. When they are teamed up with supportive dollars from the provinces, it is a game-changer. If they have mental health supports and supports to help them find jobs, in addition to having a safe place to live, it saves lives and helps to produce more productive citizens in our society.
Another thing we have done as a national government, which I am very proud of but we do not often talk about, is renewed our co-op housing agreements on a long-term basis. There are a number of co-ops in my riding. They are affordable places for families to live in and are lifesavers for so many people. They allow families to continue to live affordably in our large cities and in the centre of our cities.
There are a couple of things that I would love for us to do. One of the key things we can do, which would not cost a lot of money, is serve as a coordinating body to bring all levels of government together. We need to include developers when looking at the inflation issue and ask this: Now that inflation is at a certain amount, how do we make sure that we get things out of the way, whether at city hall, at the provincial level or with any type of regulatory issue at the federal level, so we can expedite things quicker than where we are at right now?
A number of non-profits in my community would love to build affordable housing units on top of their community centres. They have asked us to work with CMHC to better facilitate ways for them to work with CMHC to ensure they have the capital, investment, framework and support they need to create affordable housing units.
This opposition day motion talks about inflation. We have talked quite a bit in the House about a number of targeted supports that our federal government has put into place, as well as some huge programs that are literally game-changers for families in my riding of Davenport and for all Canadian families across the country.
We are talking about the grocery rebate; the Canada child benefit; the Canada workers benefit; old age security, which we have increased by 10%; and the national child care program, which means Torontonians in my riding of Davenport are saving 50% of their costs. There are also some of the newer measures just introduced in federal budget 2022, such as automatic tax filing and dental care, which will be expanded to seniors and all youth under the age of 18, as well as a number of other initiatives. When I go to people's doors and talk about these initiatives, there is a lot of appreciation for them. They are working and they are helpful.
We have an opposition day motion, and part of my disappointment with the motion is that it seems to imply the federal government is the reason inflation has reached a 40-year high and that our government, for some reason, has not so much caused our grocery prices to be higher, but has caused Canadians to cut back on their groceries. I think members of this House know that we have high inflation because of the after-effects of COVID, supply chain disruptions, the geopolitical situation we have right now, the war in Ukraine and of a lot of other global economic changes that impact inflation not only in Canada but right around the world.
I will end on a positive note. I like the fact that opposition members are concerned about housing and inflation. We should all be concerned about that. I think we should all put forward our best ideas and continue to try to work together so we can support Canadians through this very trying time.
Madam Speaker, one of the things undermining the provision of affordable housing is that when privately owned affordable housing buildings come on the market and are flipped, they often become less affordable for tenants. This is causing us to move in the opposite direction than we need to be moving in.
One of the things the government in British Columbia did was create an acquisition fund so that non-profit housing providers could buy housing projects and keep them affordable. It is something we have advocated for on a national level.
I am wondering why the member's government has not proposed something similar. If not that approach, what approach does her government see for ensuring that we do not lose existing affordable housing to private developers?
Madam Speaker, at the finance committee, which I have the privilege to serve on, we did a study on inflation and housing. We heard from a number of advocates saying that we really have to look at the REITs, which have a particular mechanism that allows companies to buy apartment buildings. What we are hearing, in many cases but not in all cases, is that apartment buildings are being bought and slightly renovated, and then the apartment rents go up exponentially, so a lot of people have to move out of what were affordable apartments.
I can tell the member that our government is looking at that. We are looking at a number of measures that are stopping us from having affordable housing and housing affordability in the marketplace. We are looking at those, and if the member has other—
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, I would like to hear what my colleague thinks of the NDP proposal to tie the level of federal funding to immigration caps within each province.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I do not know if I totally understood the question, and I apologize for that.
However, on whether there are appropriate funding levels to go with immigration levels, I think that maybe the core of the issue is probably that we are bringing in a lot more immigrants and those immigrants need housing. We have revised our immigration policies and numbers, while being very much aware that there is a housing affordability issue across this country. I do think that we keep that mind. Yes, there is a housing crisis in this country, and we keep that in mind as we move forward on our immigration policies.
Madam Speaker, I would like to give the member an opportunity to respond to a little preamble.
I appreciate that the member is recognizing that it is a housing crisis, but what is the government doing to actually build housing stock? The patchwork approach the government has taken, the whack-a-mole approach to come out with a new program for its failures, is not helpful on the long term.
We need to build more housing, both for Canadians and new Canadians. What exactly is the government doing to get more housing stock on the market?
Madam Speaker, we are doing a lot, but I will mention two key things.
One is rapid housing, which is getting a lot of housing for our most vulnerable, for new Canadians, and they are built very quickly. If we talk to mayors right across this country, they will tell members that this is a very successful program, which is why we are about to introduce the third stage. The second thing is the $4-billion housing accelerator fund, which is going to help incentivize cities to eliminate a lot of their red tape and a lot of their long timelines to get housing built in the cities.
Those are two key things that we have put into place. There are many other initiatives, but I have run out of time.
Madam Speaker, I am so pleased that the member raised the issue of REITs, the real estate investment trusts, which allow corporations to intervene and turn homes into investment properties where the prices get spiked and taxpayers lose. I was pleased to hear her say that the Liberals were interested in looking at this. Motion No. 71, introduced by the Green member for Kitchener Centre, deals with it in detail, and I hope the member will support it.
Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for raising this.
When we heard about this in the finance committee, we were all very concerned about it. My understanding is that we are looking at it right now. We are studying it, and many of us are advocating for immediate and urgent changes.
Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Kenora.
Homebuyers across Canada are confronted by two massive obstacles that they must work through as they try to buy and finance a home. First, families are struggling with the devastating impact of the Liberal government's economic mismanagement and its housing plans. To great fanfare, the government announced Canada's national housing strategy in 2017 to make housing, it said, more affordable and accessible. It has been an obvious and utter failure.
Canada's home prices have doubled since 2015. Today, the average home price in this country is an eye-popping $800,000. Ask any recent buyer or aspiring buyer if they are better off today than they were eight years ago, and the answer is a resounding, emphatic no.
The second obstacle is the cost of financing a home, which has skyrocketed. Thanks to the Liberal government's massive deficit spending, Canada's debt has doubled to $1.2 trillion. On top of that, the interest rates to service that debt have skyrocketed and will soon hit $50 billion every single year.
The indirect costs of that debt are significant. Reckless spending has fuelled inflation to levels Canadians have not seen in 40 years, and this has driven up interest costs. The result is higher mortgage payments. Today the average mortgage payment in this country has doubled to $3,000 a month. These two factors have made home ownership more expensive and pushed it out of reach for countless Canadians, particularly young Canadians.
The lack of housing and higher costs have also been ruinous to home and apartment rentals. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in Canada's 10 biggest cities is now $2,213, compared to $1,170 before Canada's Liberals broke the housing market. Vancouver and Toronto are now the third and tenth most unaffordable cities in the world, outstripping places like New York and London.
Big city governments that delay permits and have excess red tape and taxes can add as much as $200,000 to the cost of each new home built in this country. No wonder people cannot afford to buy a home, with prices like this being driven up by the gatekeepers.
Owning a home and raising a family are the foundation of the Canadian dream, yet for many this dream appears to be slipping further and further away. It is out of reach because the Liberals are out of touch. Home ownership has become an impossibility for too many Canadians since the Liberals first took office. In Canada, it is considered affordable to buy a home if the cost is less than 30% of a household's before-tax income. It now takes 60% of Canadians' income to cover the cost of owning a home. Those who have scrimped and saved for years to afford their first home now find themselves questioning if they can ever achieve the Canadian dream.
This crisis did not happen overnight. It has steadily worsened every year the Liberals have been in office. The Bank of Canada's governor, as well as the finance minister, led people to believe that interest rates would remain low. Today, thousands of Canadians are grappling with the stark reality that those entrusted with governing and overseeing the nation's finances failed.
The Canadian dream was once a straightforward proposition: work hard; play by the rules; finish school; get a decent job; get married; save each month for a down payment; have a family; and one day retire, owning one's home. However, for many of my constituents in New Brunswick, those who have done everything right, this dream is unattainable today. That is, no matter how hard families work or how much they save, the dream of home ownership is a mirage.
The Liberals have failed to deliver affordable housing, and that was made abundantly clear in the Auditor General's report last November, which revealed that, despite spending tens of billions of dollars, and the Liberals are great at rattling off program after program and the mounds of money they have spent, when it comes to homelessness, the numbers keep rising.
The Auditor General says that the departments responsible, Infrastructure Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada, failed to even adequately track results, instead relying on outdated national shelter data to assess the effectiveness of their programs. In fact, the government's numbers, even using numbers the Auditor General said were less than reliable, indicate homelessness has increased nationally by 6.6% since 2018. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of people who no longer have homes.
The Auditor General also underscored that the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or CMHC, which oversees the majority of the housing strategies under the government, has no idea who benefits from its initiatives. Low-income families are being priced out of the market by funding rental housing that is supposedly affordable, but proves to be unaffordable for working families. It is an absolute mess.
Housing is one pillar of the Canadian dream, and the other is raising a family, yet the high cost of living, driven by inflated housing prices, has further discouraged Canadians from that other joy of life, which is starting a family. The average household debt in Canada reached 183% of disposable income in 2022, limiting the financial freedom and security of many Canadians.
The risk of homelessness is also going up because demand for homes has surpassed supply. New Brunswick's many affordable units were purchased in the last couple of years in my riding. This has forced people out, as buyers either moved in or increased rents. Families have been forced to move elsewhere to work and live. This has had a twin impact on the labour market, as small communities now cannot keep young families, which tend to be part of the economic foundation of these economies because they provide work for businesses and start small businesses, and it is not always by choice. This is happening because they are being priced right out of their neighbourhoods.
For those who cannot move or find an affordable place to live, the result is sadly and frequently homelessness, and this has a devastating impact on one's mental health, as well as personal safety. For the most vulnerable, those who are on the edge of poverty or trying to break the cycle, there are nowhere near enough shelter spaces, supported housing for persons with addictions or disabilities, rental units, or even starter homes. It is imperative that we address the housing crisis at its core by scaling up and building more. No government program is going to solve this problem. We need to build homes for future families. The Liberals cannot, but Conservatives will get it done.
The CMHC has noted that, as of April 27, the housing shortage throughout Canada is going to worsen. The agency has predicted that there will be a 32% decline in home building this year, as the cost of borrowing remains high and building costs have risen by 20% in the past year alone.
How is the carbon tax working now? We said it was a tax on everything, and it is. It is driving up the cost of living in this country, especially on new homes. It is Canadians, despite the government insisting it is doing everything right, who are paying the price. A Conservative government would incentivize home construction across Canada.
Step one would be to fix Canada's affordability crisis is restoring credibility to Ottawa's budgets. We would restore the federal government's finances, which have contributed to inflation and higher interest rates on home buyers. We would impose penalties on big city gatekeepers for excessive obstruction of housing projects. We would require cities seeking federal funds to pre-approve zoning for high-density housing and employment on land surrounding transit stations and hubs.
Last, we will sell off at least 15% of underutilized federal buildings in its property to ensure these buildings become affordable housing for families.
We must make the dream of home ownership a reality for families again. This is the only way we can secure a brighter future for our nation, for our children and for the next generation.
Madam Speaker, I certainly appreciated the speech of my hon. colleague. I am just not sure what side of the fence he is on because, on one hand, he wants the federal government to take more action and, on the other hand, he, I believe, as a Conservative, would agree that it is market forces that determine a lot of housing affordability and it is individuals, Canadians and companies and so on, that build housing.
Does my colleague agree with his colleagues, such as the member of Parliament for Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon and the member for Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, who have said that the government should do less on housing and pull back from its investments in the national housing strategy?
Madam Speaker, I am not sure the member was listening to my speech. Nowhere did I say the government ought to spend more and do more. If anything, the government's spending is one of the reasons that inflation has been on fire in this country and home ownership is more difficult. I am not sure where that criticism came from, or the belief that I think the Liberals are not doing enough. They are actually going in the wrong direction.
When it comes to the markets, the federal government has the most responsibility for setting the conditions for economic growth and home construction. It has failed utterly. The problem is the Liberals do not recognize they are going in the wrong direction. That is why we need a new direction, under Conservatives.
[Translation]
Madam Speaker, on April 25, the Conservative member for Battlefords—Lloydminster said the following in the House:
...I am someone in this place who is on the record about respecting provincial jurisdiction. I believe provinces actually know better than the federal government does when it comes to their own jurisdiction and what works. Again, I respect provincial jurisdiction and provinces know what is best for the people who live in them.
The debate was on housing.
Given that the Conservatives have decided to move an “Ottawa-knows-best” motion that imposes conditions on the provinces, does my colleague think that the member for Battlefords—Lloydminster will be uneasy about voting in favour of the Conservative motion?
Madam Speaker, I have no idea. We would have to ask the member that question.
I am here to support this motion with the other Conservative members. I am ready to do that.
[English]
Madam Speaker, I live in Vancouver, which I think is the epicentre for the housing crisis not only in this country but around the world. It is fair to say that it is indeed a crisis.
Housing anchors us in our communities. It is not just a commodity that can be traded, purchased and sold. It is an absolute necessity. It is how people anchor themselves for work; their children go to schools and people connect to community.
This has been a crisis for many years I was just curious to put this to my hon. colleague. To hear him speak, one would think the housing crisis in Vancouver and the Lower Mainland began in 2015. I can tell the member most assuredly it did not. It started back in the early 1990s when the government of Brian Mulroney actually cancelled the federal government's participation in the national housing program and, of course, the Liberals promised to restore it and did not, so we have really had an absent federal partner for many decades.
I wonder if the member acknowledges that. Could he tell us what specifically he would do to make sure that we can build truly affordable housing and not just rely on market supply? What does he think the federal government could do to make sure that people get access to social or affordable housing?
Madam Speaker, there are two points from the hon. member that I would like to respond to.
First of all, that is what makes this problem so infuriating. What began as an issue primarily for Vancouver and Toronto has now spread across the country. Even the smallest communities in my riding on the east coast, places with populations of 6,000 and 8,000, are experiencing homelessness, a lack of affordable housing and huge, huge price increases. This has been growing and I recognize that, but what is fundamental to understand is how much worse it has become over the last eight years with home prices doubling across the country. It is a tough file and there is no doubt about it, but it has become so much worse under a government that is doing everything wrong.
Where I disagree with my hon. colleague is that the NDP views the housing stock as static, as fixed, and that we have to try to control and regulate it. Our view on this side is that we need to expand the stock of homes—
Business of the House
Madam Speaker, I request that the ordinary hour of daily adjournment for the next sitting be 12 o'clock midnight, pursuant to order made Tuesday, November 15, 2022.
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Business of Supply
Opposition Motion—Home Ownership and Renting Affordability
The House resumed consideration of the motion.
Madam Speaker, I greatly appreciate the opportunity to take part in this important discussion today on our opposition day motion looking to address the housing crisis that we are seeing right across this country.
It truly is a crisis. Unfortunately, the housing minister has not been able to say that it is a crisis, but at least we have heard that terminology reflected in the comments of some of the other members of his caucus. I believe the hon. member for Davenport mentioned that it is a crisis. It is great to see that although the minister may not acknowledge it, some of the Liberal members are able to acknowledge that.
When we look across the country, we have seen that over the last eight years housing prices have doubled. Many young people feel they will never be able to own a home. The cities of Toronto and Vancouver have been mentioned by many of my colleagues. Those two cities are among the most unaffordable places to live in the world. As my colleague from New Brunswick Southwest mentioned, it takes many people up to 60% of their income just to be able to afford a home these days after eight years of this Liberal government.
It is incredibly concerning for a number of reasons. One that hits me is that the Liberal government has spent so much money on housing accelerators, housing strategies and all these wonderful things that the Liberals like to say are getting the job done, but the fact of the matter is that it is not getting the job done. The housing crisis is far worse in this country than it was when the Liberals took office.
Never before has a government spent so much to achieve so little. In fact, we have the fewest houses per capita of any of our allies in the G7, despite having an incredible wealth of land in this country.
As we know, Liberal spending has led inflation to rise to 40-year highs, making the cost of everything more expensive, and also leading to interest rates rising, making housing and constructive even more expensive. In fact, it is estimated that this coming year, there will be a 32% decline in construction. That would be a direct result of the government's policies and would make it even more difficult to build housing in this country. As well, there are 63 countries where it is faster to get a building permit for that construction than in Canada.
We have a lot of work to do to get more homes built, to speed up those permits, to make it possible to get things built in Canada once again. That includes removing taxes and fees that are, on average, adding $200,000 to the cost of every new home in Canada. When we put that all together, it is very clear that it is a housing crisis.
I mentioned Vancouver and Toronto. Obviously, these crises are in the major centres, but we are also seeing this crisis play out in my backyard, in northwestern Ontario, in communities like Kenora, Dryden, Sioux Lookout and Red Lake. Right across northwestern Ontario, there are challenges, not necessarily from the affordability side but from the supply side, in particular. Homes are being sold before they can even get to market, because there are so few available. As of now, the Kenora District Services Board estimates that there are 1,300 households currently on an affordable housing wait-list in the Kenora District. That is an increase of 1,000 in the last nine years.
I want to share a little about my own story. Recently, just in the last year, I purchased my home in my riding. It was a long process. It took over a year for me to be able to find that house. I lost out on many bids, because of the fact that there is such little supply. A house would come on the market, and it was almost impossible to get access to it unless one was right there at the front of the line. That highlights the crisis.
I did ask my sister her permission to share this story. She is moving back to Kenora after spending the last few years in Thunder Bay. She and her boyfriend both have great jobs. He is an engineer and she is taking on a new role doing X-rays at the Kenora district hospital, and they are struggling to find a place to live.
It goes without saying that this housing affordability issue is obviously a concern for the people who are struggling to find a place to live, but it is a concern for our entire economy in northwestern Ontario. We cannot attract new people to our region. We cannot attract people such as my sister to come back to the region to work, live and raise their families if they have nowhere to live.
That is one of the most major impediments to our economic development in northwestern Ontario. We have shortages of health care workers. We have shortages of workers in virtually every sector, including tourism, which is so vital to our economy in the summer months. We cannot fill those gaps in large part due to the fact there is such little housing supply.
I will share another personal angle on this. I had the opportunity to be in Thunder Bay last week for the Northern Ontario Municipal Association conference. It was a great conference, and I was able to speak with mayors from across northwestern Ontario. I also had an opportunity to catch up with some colleagues, some friends of mine from university. They are just finishing their degrees at Thunder Bay and are trying to figure out where to go next. Again, the housing challenges have led many to believe they cannot come back home to Kenora or Dryden because they cannot find a place to live, and they are not sure where they will be able to lay their roots.
Another aspect of this housing crisis that faces our region is around first nations housing. The Kenora riding encompasses 42 first nations, and many of the homes in the communities are unfortunately in disrepair. There is, similar to the rest of the country, an issue of supply. There are still far too many people who do not own their homes or who are not able to own their homes on reserve.
In fact, during my last visit to Kasabonika, I was speaking with the community representatives about their difficulty in just being able to grow. The population is growing. They have a very young population. They have nowhere to build because government regulations and government bureaucracy is making it difficult for them to obtain new land to be able to build housing, new schools and all the critical infrastructure they need.
There is obviously an incredible challenge, but an incredible opportunity as well for the federal government to work with first nations to ensure there is an equity partnership in new infrastructure developments and resource projects so we can create more economic development, good jobs and really raise the economic level to hopefully raise more and more people out of poverty to a point where they can get into a position to be able to afford their home, whether they live on reserve or off of it.
Unfortunately, I am running out of time, but I would like to speak specifically to our motion that we put forward today to deal with this crisis. What our party is proposing is to tie federal infrastructure dollars for municipalities to the number of new homes built to ensure we can speed up building permits and free up more land for development.
We are also proposing to tie federal funding to major transit to ensure there are condos and apartments around those transit facilities. Granted, that is not something we will be seeing in our riding, but it is important for the larger centres. Of course, we are working to free up 15% of underused federal properties for development. That is something that would be huge in places like Ear Falls and Sioux Narrows-Nestor Falls, where there is no shortage of land but there is a shortage of ability to access that land.
That is the plan we are putting forward to help address this housing crisis, and I urge all my colleagues in this chamber to support it.
Madam Speaker, Conservatives keep going back to punishing municipalities that do not build affordable housing and taking away their infrastructure. How can they build more housing if they do not have money for the infrastructure from the federal government, as a partner in it? They are defeating the very purpose of what they are trying to do.
I came from the municipal level before I got here, and the municipality has to be involved in any home-building projects in a community, whether it is issuing permits or making sure they are inspected properly for the Canadian building code. We cannot eliminate the so-called gatekeepers that they keep referring to as municipalities. They have to be a part of it. They have to be a part of this equation.
Again, punishing them and taking away infrastructure defeats the purpose of trying to get more housing built in any community.
Madam Speaker, as I mentioned in my remarks, I had the opportunity to join the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association last week and was able to connect with all nine mayors from my riding. I can say that they were incredibly enthusiastic about the approach that we are bringing forward because they know we need to get more development moving forward.<