Ottawa, ON – After eight years of Justin Trudeau, Canadians are living in a housing hell. In 2022, Canada built fewer homes than we did in 1972 when the population was half of what it is today. As a direct consequence of the Liberals’ inability to get enough houses built, average asking rents for all residential property reached a record high of $2,178 in December, while the cost of a downpayment has doubled since Trudeau became Prime Minister.
Trudeau’s own Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation said in September that Canada needs 3.5 million new homes by the end of the decade, but housing starts have continued to decline under this Liberal Government. CIBC has said the number of homes needed is actually 5 million. And what’s Trudeau’s plan to fix his housing crisis? He appointed his former Immigration Minister, Sean Fraser, as the Minister of Housing, who previously ignored warnings from his own staff that his reckless policies were contributing to the housing shortage.
Today, in Finance Committee, Common Sense Conservative MPs asked Minister Fraser about his “housing accelerator fund,” and he admitted that not a single home has been built as a result of it, even though it has cost the Canadian taxpayer $3.15 billion. He even admitted that his flagship housing policy “doesn’t actually lead to the construction of specific homes.” The Trudeau government doesn’t understand that Canadians can’t live in photo-ops.
On top of this, despite campaigning on the “housing accelerator” in the 2021 federal election, the Liberal Government did not start making agreements with municipalities to get homes built until late 2023. Now, Canadian cities are among the most expensive in the world. Justin Trudeau just isn’t worth the cost.
Canadians deserve a common sense plan to get housing built fast. This is why Pierre Poilievre introduced his Building Homes, Not Bureaucracy Act, to increase incentives to municipalities that build homes while punishing municipalities that continue to stand in the way of development with NIMBY policies.
Only a Pierre Poilievre government will bring homes that Canadians can afford.