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Mr. Chair, I really appreciate this question, because it gives me an opportunity to talk about the divisiveness of the leader of the official opposition in calling the mayors, the elected officials in this country, “woke”, and denigrating them and calling them “incompetent”. We need to work with local governments, we need to work with mayors and we need to work with municipalities to increase hous…
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Mr. Chair, we are committed to building more rentals in this country. They did not have a plan. We put together the rental construction financing initiative, which is about building more rental supply right across the country.
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Mr. Chair, what we are witnessing is someone who does not have a plan for housing and someone who does not have a plan to support renters.
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Mr. Chair, that question points to the need for collaboration. Of course, the federal government has a very important leadership role to play in unlocking more housing supply across the country. We have the fastest-growing population of the G7 but very low housing supply. The federal government has a key role to play in that, but we cannot do it alone. We need collaboration and partnership from th…
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Mr. Chair, I do not interrupt the other side. It is interfering with my right to reply to the questions from the leader.
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Mr. Chair, I did not interrupt the party opposite. I would appreciate it if the members did not interrupt me. I have the right to respond, as I have been asked a question, and it is becoming routine now. The fact of the matter is that when it comes to housing supply, he has voted against measures to increase housing supply. When it comes to housing affordability and the measures to help homebuyers…
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Mr. Chair, the Conservatives have all the questions tonight, but they have no plan on housing, and they have no help for Canadians who actually need help with housing.
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Mr. Chair, it is hard to take the party opposite seriously on rent, when it voted against the Canada housing benefit, which delivers rental supports to Canadians.
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Mr. Chair, it is pretty rich seeing the leader of the official opposition ask me these questions when he has voted against measures to help Canadians access their dream of home ownership.
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Madam Chair, why did the Conservatives vote against the Canada housing benefit that is helping renters?
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Mr. Chair, at least he should explain to Canadians why he votes against measures to increase supply. He has been in this House saying that he cares about more supply and getting rid of gatekeepers, but he is the biggest gatekeeper when it comes to actually investing in measures and investments to create more supply for Canadians. He should—
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Mr. Chair, different prices can be seen in different parts of the country, so I would like the leader of the official opposition to recognize that fact.
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Mr. Chair, most of the numbers the leader quoted were wrong. For someone who has voted against supports for renters, supports for home buyers, supports for building supplies and supports for the most vulnerable people in Canada, it is very rich to see all these questions coming from him as if he cares about this issue.
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Mr. Chair, I am happy to provide numbers. If the Leader of the Opposition wants to keep doing this for the next five hours, I am happy to do it.
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Mr. Chair, our population is growing because we have a robust immigration policy, but we also have a growing economy. The issues that the leader points to are issues associated with growth, with low unemployment numbers, high economic growth and high immigration. Skilled people are coming to Canada to help us grow our communities and our economy. If he is against that, he should come out and say t…
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Mr. Chair, it is an honour to stand here to debate my colleagues. We know that Canadians are facing challenges in accessing their dream of home ownership. We are doing everything we can to help them get there.
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Mr. Chair, if the Conservatives are serious about rental supports, why did they vote against the Canada housing benefit, which is delivering real supports to Canadian renters?
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Mr. Chair, I just want to correct a few things that have been asserted by the hon. member. The Auditor General looked at the Reaching Home strategy and she looked at the performance of the Reaching Home strategy mainly during the pandemic. The Auditor General did not look at the entire national housing strategy program. I just want to clear that misconception. Secondly, the hon. member seems to do…
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Mr. Chair, we know there is a challenge with the rising costs of housing. That is why we have implemented a number of policies to enable Canadians to access their dream of home ownership.
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Mr. Chair, I also noticed that you are not giving me the same amount of time as the questioner to answer.
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Mr. Chair, I would like to know how the Conservatives plan to cut supports for renters and then stand here and pretend to care about renters.
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Mr. Chair, we have. We have shown leadership and here is the proof. We have invested over half a billion dollars to continue doubling the annual funding for Reaching Home, which is Canada's homelessness strategy. We have gone from just over $2 billion to almost $4 billion in response to the urgent need on the ground. Our investments are paying off. We have prevented over 62,000 people from experie…
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Mr. Chair, I am proud to stand behind the national housing co-investment fund. It is a great program that supports non-profits, as well as municipalities, to invest in deeply affordable housing. We are committed to this program for years to come.
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Mr. Chair, I am really perplexed by the logic of the hon. member. She says that our national housing strategy is not really doing anything on the ground. Contrary to that, I can report back to the hon. member that we have invested in either repairing or building 500,000 units; this has supported almost two million Canadian households. That is the impact the national housing strategy has had on thi…
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Mr. Chair, does the hon. member believe that every Canadian has a right to housing? We do. Do the Conservatives?
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Mr. Chair, they absolutely do not care about Canadian renters because, if they did, they would not have voted against the Canada housing benefit or the top-up to the Canada housing benefit. In the member's own province of Alberta, the Canada housing benefit is helping 35,000 households. He voted against it.
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Mr. Chair, I believe and our government believes that we need more housing supply. They do not. They want to spend less, and they somehow expect more housing will be built in this country.
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Mr. Chair, this is a program that delivers deeply affordable housing every day, right across the country. We are committed to continuing to invest in this program. In fact, we have brought $2.9 billion forward, from future years to this year.
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Mr. Chair, this is an example of what can be done at the local level through investments in the national housing strategy. We were able to partner with local Legions in a number of communities, including Sault Ste. Marie, and with local indigenous governments and organizations to build deeply affordable housing, housing that not only rejuvenates local Legions, some of whose buildings are falling i…
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Mr. Chair, we will do so by taking the investment under the housing accelerator fund, $4 billion, which will go directly to municipalities, local governments, indigenous communities and other governments to build more housing supply. How are we going to do that? We will invest in their systems, their ability to permit housing and deliver it faster. We will also present plans and incentivize them t…
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Mr. Chair, it is very perplexing. Conservatives talk about, for example, connecting housing to infrastructure. We have been doing that for two years. They talk about investing in municipalities and removing the obstacles to more supply. That is exactly what the housing accelerator fund will do. We are very much perplexed by the fact that they keep voting against the measures and investments that a…
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Mr. Chair, it is possible because we launched the housing accelerator fund in the morning, and the leader of the official opposition came up with this plan for more housing supply the same afternoon. However, their copy job was not good enough because it did not even capture the breadth and comprehensiveness of our plan.
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Mr. Chair, I will take the party opposite's rhetoric on housing seriously when it actually produces a real plan on housing.
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Mr. Chair, it is not fearmongering to actually do something about a challenge. Fearmongering is voting against real measures to help Canadians, Canadian renters, homebuyers and the most vulnerable find a place to call home, and then coming to the House of Commons to express fake outrage about something the Conservatives continually vote against, which is real help for Canadians. It is hard to take…
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Mr. Chair, I will do it again by saying that I have provided that information. It is regional, and I am happy to provide the regional breakdowns to the leader.
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Mr. Chair, the hon. member points to a really important aspect of our national housing strategy: We are investing throughout the spectrum of housing to meet the needs of Canadians wherever they are in the housing spectrum. We have the rapid housing initiative, Reaching Home for those who are experiencing homelessness or are at risk of experiencing homelessness, the national housing co-investment f…
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Mr. Chair, this is coming from a party that believes we should do less on housing and not more, and believes that somehow the problem will take care of itself.
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Mr. Chair, I would really like to understand how building more rentals by investing less money makes sense on that side of the House.
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Mr. Chair, this is pretty rich coming from a party that has no housing plan.
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Mr. Chair, the hon. member should understand that federal leadership means trusting local authorities to make the decisions necessary, but also empowering them to add more supply to housing in Canada. Their approach is to attack local mayors, calling them names, denigrating them and calling them incompetent, while somehow hoping that is going to create more housing.
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Mr. Chair, I know Covenant House; It does good work. The member opposite as well as his party voted against more funding for organizations serving the homeless community.
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Madam Chair, every single individual experiencing homelessness is a tragedy for our community, but we are investing more than any government.
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Madam Chair, the proof is in the votes. If the hon. member and her party cared about homelessness, then why did they vote against increasing investments?
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Madam Chair, the hon. member's logic is to do less on housing but somehow produce more housing. How does that make sense?
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Mr. Chair, we have been tying infrastructure to housing for the last two years. They just came around to that idea recently, and they announced their half-baked plan on the same day we launched the housing accelerator fund, which is about connecting community infrastructure and transit to more housing supply.
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Mr. Chair, voting against every measure we bring to this House to help young people access their dream of home ownership is not much of a plan either.
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Mr. Chair, the average price of a home in Canada in 2022 was $703,000.
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Mr. Chair, it is very rich having these types of questions coming from that side, when they believe the federal government should do less on housing, not more.
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