By Rohana Rezel
Here’s an analysis of how each party plans tackle the housing affordability crisis affecting millions of people in Canada’s big cities.
| Liberal 4 | Conservative3 | NDP2 | Green1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Increase First-Time Home Buyer Incentive eligibility limit to $800K | Fix(?) the mortgage stress test | Create 500,000 units of quality, affordable housing | Legislate housing as a legally protected fundamental human right for all Canadians and permanent residents |
| National tax on vacant residential properties owned by non-Canadians who don’t live in Canada | Extend the maximum amortization period on mortgages for first-time home buyers to 30 years | Kick-start the construction of co-ops, social and non-profit housing, with dedicated fast-start funds | Appoint a Minister of Housing to strengthen the National Housing Strategy and build 25,000 new and 15,000 rehabilitated units annually for the next 10 years |
| Launch a public inquiry into money laundering in the real estate sector | Waive the federal portion of the GST/HST on the construction of new affordable rental units | Increase the National Housing Co-investment Fund by $750 million for new builds, and the Canada Housing Benefit by $750 million for rent assistance for 125,000 households |
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| Make surprlus federal real estate available for development | Provide immediate relief(?) for families that are struggling to afford rent in otherwise suitable housing | Create a Canada Co-op Housing Strategy that would update the mechanisms for financing co-op housing,in partnership with CMHC, co-op societies, credit unions and other lenders | |
| Reward(?) municipalities that have proven to reduce red tape that stands in the way of new home construction | CMHCbacked co-ownership mortgages to facilitate co-housing | Eliminate the first-time home buyer grant | |
| Put in place a Foreign Buyer’s tax on the sale of homes to individuals who aren’t Canadian citizens or permanent residents | Include new and existing housing as eligible infrastructure for funding purposes, allowing the Canada Infrastructure Bank to support provincial and municipal housing projects |
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| Work with the provinces to create a public beneficial ownership registry to increase transparency about who owns properties, and require reporting of suspicious transactions in order to help find and stop money laundering | Provide financing to non-profit housing organizations and cooperatives to build and restore quality, energy efficient housing for seniors, people with special needs and low-income families |
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| Extend the maximum amortization period on mortgages for first-time home buyers to 30 years | Restore tax incentives for building purpose-built rental housing and provide tax credits for gifts of lands, or of land and buildings, to community land trusts to provide affordable housing |
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| Remove the “deemed” GST whenever a developer with empty condo units places them on the market as rentals |
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| Re-focus the core mandate of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporate (CMHC) on supporting the development of affordable, non-market and cooperative housing, as opposed to its current priority of supporting Canadian lenders to de-risk investment in housing ownership |
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| Change the legislation that prevents Indigenous organizations from accessing financing through CMHC to invest in self-determined housing needs |
Highlights
The Good
- Both the NDP and the Greens plan to massively build out public housing
- Both the NDP and the Greens intend to support co-ops and co-housing
- Both the Liberals and NDP have promised a foreign buyer tax
- Both the Conservatives and NDP have plans to tackle money laundering
- Greens have pledged to end the First-Time Home Buyer Incentive, a program that has the potential to inflate home prices without fixing the affordability crisis
The Bad
- The Liberals plan to increase First-Time Home Buyer Incentive eligibility limit, thereby adding more fuel to the affordability fire
- The Conservatives plan to “fix” the mortgage stress to make it easier for borrowers, potentially leading to irresponsible borrowing and further debt-driven inflation of the housing bubble
- The Conservatives and the NDP plan to increase mortgage amortization period to 30 years, leading to further debt-driven inflation of the housing bubble
The Ugly
- The Conservatives will reward cities that give real estate developers a carte blanche to build whatever they want wherever they want. Given the track record of Vancouver developers, this policy would result in vulnerable tenants being thrown out on to the streets to make way for, in the words of developer Westbank, “safety deposit boxes for the global rich.”
- https://www.greenparty.ca/sites/default/files/platform_2019_web_update_oct_6.pdf
- https://action.ndp.ca/page/-/2019/Q2/2019-06-19_Commitments-Doc_EN.pdf
- https://cpc-platform.s3.ca-central-1.amazonaws.com/CPC_Platform_8.5x11_FINAL_EN_OCT11_web.pdf
- https://2019.liberal.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/292/2019/09/Forward-A-real-plan-for-the-middle-class.pdf
The Liberals fulfill 90% of their campaign promises. In this election, more so than in the Harper election, the CPC and Scheer have resorted to telling lie after lie, much like their hero to the south. They have based nearly their entire campaign on lies and inducing fear. I expect them to not fulfil a single one of those promises listed above and will in fact increase the housing problem as well as income disparity.
The Liberals have absolutely lied and broken so many MAJOR promises.
1 – didn’t institute proportional representation (this lie alone should be enough to never vote liberal again)
2 – bought a G*D* pipeline in the middle of global warming
3 – promise to decrease corruption but good lord look at the SLC Lavalin situation
4 – where is the clean water on reserves? Or fixing the grassy narrows mercury situation?
5 – housing crisis is still raging with no real investment in policies to help the most vulnerable
What did they even do in the last 4 years other than semi-botch cannabis legalization?
Affordable housing should be the basic right of every citizen of the country as these new measures do not satisfy the requirements. They need to come up with a better plan for it.