Parliamentary Speeches

Mr. Speaker, there are two aspects to that question. One, of course, is that the Liberal government needs to take action and say no to wealthy investors, real estate investment trusts and corporate landlords continuing to sweep up affordable, low-cost apartments and then renovicting and displacing people. We need to say no to that and put a moratorium in place. The second piece in the member's question is about providing a fund to support tenants. Of course that should be done. The recommendation is for the government to review this. The government should just do it, because right now, as we speak, people are getting renovicted. Let us not just think about it anymore. Let us not walk around the block on the issue anymore. We should take action now.

Mr. Speaker, just to be clear on the record, the NDP is fighting for people. We did get $8.3 billion invested in indigenous housing, for both distinction-based and urban, rural and northern communities. We did get the government to invest in the accelerator fund. We did get the government to invest in co-op housing and a variety of other measures. Is it enough? Absolutely not. Are New Democrats going to push for more? Everyone can bet we are. With respect to the mayor of Toronto, let us be clear. It is my understanding that she and the late Jack Layton lived in co-op housing. People in co-op housing in that sector were actually paying market rent because a lot of times, these housing projects brought in a balance of one-third, one-third and one-third: one-third market, one-third subsidized and one-third below market. They were doing what most people would want to see: a successful model of co-op housing, ensuring that we build communities that have a mix of incomes in those projects.

Mr. Speaker, Quebec should be respected. All provinces and territories should be respected. Local governments should be respected. We need the federal government to show leadership and invest in housing. When the federal government walked away, Quebec and British Columbia were the only two provinces that continued to ensure that social and co-op housing were being developed and would be there for the community. I commend Quebec for doing that. However, what do the Conservatives say? They say that investing in co-op housing is a “Soviet-style” of housing. I mean, to me, that is absolutely shocking. I look at Quebec, and I do not see Putin there. I see people who care about the community and who are building the housing the community needs.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for her advocacy for the community, not just on the housing front but on every aspect of the rights for indigenous peoples. She has been there fighting for them. I have to say that I remain disappointed with the government's lack of commitment in ensuring that housing is a basic human right, no matter who one is or where one comes from, right across this country. Indigenous people suffer on many fronts due to Canada's colonial history, and housing is one aspect of that. We also know from the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and its report recommendations that one of the significant reasons indigenous women and girls are subject to violence is the lack of housing. From that perspective, if there is to be true reconciliation, there needs to be investments commensurate with need for indigenous people on reserve and off reserve. No matter where they are, that housing right should follow them, and we should honour the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Mr. Speaker, that exchange was this morning between me and the Conservative leader, after his speech when I asked him a question. I was saying to the Conservatives that the government needs to substantively invest in social housing and co-op housing. I cited some examples because the Conservative leader said that Singapore is a leader that we should look to with respect to housing. I reminded him that, in Singapore, 80% of housing is social housing. By the way, he also mentioned France as a model that we should be looking to. France actually provides 17% of its housing as social housing. The Conservative leader's response was that he did not want to see the government taking over in the delivery of housing because it would be “a Soviet-style takeover of housing.”

Mr. Speaker, humanity faces unprecedented danger from climate change and biodiversity loss, yet while the earth is on fire, government inaction is equivalent to pouring gasoline on the flames. This past summer, the CEO of Suncor made troubling remarks about the need to maximize profits in an industry that has seen record profits over the last two years. CEOs of big oil companies raked in billions of dollars while communities across Canada were ravaged by forest fires. These companies are taking no responsibility for their decades-long pollution. The Liberals have given big oil free rein to fuel the climate crisis and maximize profits. The NDP wants to see an end to subsidies and to see stronger emissions caps on these big oil and gas companies to stop their decades-long free ride. It is time to end their greed and protect the future of our planet.

Mr. Speaker, The Auditor General has reinforced findings from two Pollara reports of racist outcomes in Canada's immigration system. Regional disparities continue to create longer processing times for those in sub-Saharan Africa. Meanwhile, new AI tools discriminatingly double wait times for Haitian citizens. The Liberals said they would address regional disparities in 2016, but the Auditor General found they have done nothing. This is outrageous. People's lives are hanging in the balance. Will the government take immediate action to put in place an independent ombudsperson to end the systemic racism in IRCC?

Mr. Speaker, part of the legislation is a clause that justifies past discrimination and violations of human rights. It would allow for the government to have discriminated without impunity and underscores the sense of colonial entitlement. Does the member agree that the provisions of this legislation would prohibit first nations women from seeking compensation for historical harms? Is it justified that the government denied first nations women access to health care, education and safe housing?

Mr. Speaker, the auditor issued a damning report about processing delays in immigration. The most vulnerable are made to wait the longest due to Liberal mismanagement. Offices in sub-Saharan Africa are chronically underfunded, and they have the highest volume. Applications are untouched for up to 20 months. The average wait time for refugees is now three years. People who are being persecuted do not have three years to wait. Will the minister take immediate action to process the unacceptable backlogs for refugees?

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the wisdom and knowledge she has brought to the House on this issue. Successive Liberal and Conservative governments have failed indigenous, Inuit and Métis people with their incremental approach to reconciliation. In fact, I still remember that the Conservatives under the Harper government said that the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls issue is an Indian issue. Here we are today with this bill, yet another bill with an incremental approach. Can the member advise the House on what generational damages she sees for the people, the women and families on the ground as a result of Canada's colonial and incremental approach to ensuring indigenous rights are respected.

Mr. Speaker, city of Toronto housing advocates have warned that unhoused people will die as the weather gets colder. Toronto's shelter system, the largest in Canada, is beyond capacity. Hundreds of people are being turned away every day, including refugees and asylum seekers. Successive Liberal and Conservative governments have walked away from housing and left the city scrambling to house people in need. Toronto is pleading for support. Will the Liberals step up to provide the funding required to the city of Toronto so no one has to sleep or die on the streets this winter?

Mr. Chair, I have many constituents who are very worried about their loved ones. Some of them are Canadians who are in Gaza at the moment, and some of them have sponsored family members who have yet to make it to Canada. They are trying to find a way to get to safety. Many of them cannot access GAC services for evacuation. Others are simply looking for a pathway that could help them get to a corridor of safety. What is the government doing to provide evacuation for Canadian families abroad, individuals abroad who have permanent resident status and loved ones who are waiting for their sponsorship to be completed so they can get to safety?

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to enter into this debate. With respect to housing in Canada, as we all know, we are faced with an intense chronic housing crisis. In fact, I would argue that the Conservatives, when they were in government, were the ones who cancelled the co-op program, which is a proven model in Canada that provides safe, secure, affordable housing to community members. More than that, co-op housing provides a community within a community through that model. What did the Conservatives do in 1992? They cancelled the national co-op housing program. Now, based on the discussion and the leader of the Conservatives, one would think they are going to be the saviour in addressing the housing crisis, but let us be clear: They Conservatives were the people who helped cause the housing crisis we are faced with today in this country. Of course, after the Conservatives cut funding for housing programs and eliminated the co-op program altogether, we had the Liberals come into office. What did they do? They cancelled the national affordable housing program in 1993, further escalating the housing crisis. The truth is that successive Liberal and Conservative governments failed Canadians. They failed to ensure that there was social housing built, and they failed to ensure that there was co-op housing built, to the point of where we are today. I still remember, when I was in the community in 1993 working as a community legal advocate, the shock that went through my system and through our whole community when we heard that the government had cancelled the program. Part of my job was to try to assist people, including seniors, people with disabilities, indigenous people and women. There were women fleeing violence and women who needed housing because they were in a domestic violence situation. They needed housing for themselves and their children, and they were losing their children because they could not secure safe, affordable housing. It was not because they were bad parents, but because successive Liberal and Conservative federal governments walked away from them and did not provide the housing that was critically needed then. Fast-forward to today, and where are we at? We have a situation where, just today, a report came out that in my community in Vancouver East and in the greater Vancouver area, it was found in the most recent study that the homelessness count had increased by 30% from the last count. The truth is that, in many ways, I do not need a report to tell me so, although having that data is really important, because I see it in the community with the encampments that have surfaced. It is everywhere. It has proliferated everywhere. In my riding of Vancouver East, we have a permanent encampment. What is wrong with this picture? We have to ask this question. Why is it that successive Liberal and Conservative governments have allowed this to happen? It is unjustifiable. Housing is for people to live in; it is not a commodity for investors to use to turn a bigger and bigger profit. That is what has happened over the years since the Liberals and Conservatives walked away from co-op and social housing. They allow the market to flourish and then to benefit from it at the expense of people who need homes. Not only are people unhoused; renters are also getting renovicted. Seniors on fixed income, long-time tenants in a building, are being displaced and renovicted, and they will no longer have access to a home. They cannot afford a home. They will no longer be able to live in the place where they have lived for many years. This was allowed under both Liberals and Conservatives and was escalated, I would say, by their bad housing policy and by their walking away from the people in our communities that are in need. We will hear the Liberals say that in 2017, they entered back into the housing environment with the national housing strategy. If anybody has taken the time to read it, and I urge all Liberal members to pick it up, the report from the Auditor General indicated they do not even know who is benefiting from the government's programs. In fact, they do not even know whether those who are in need, those who are most vulnerable, are accessing the supports they need. “Incompetence” would be one way of describing it, but it is not justifiable with where things are at today. Now, the Conservatives have a leader who goes around acting as though he were the saviour. Let us be clear: When he was part of the Harper administration as a cabinet minister, under that administration, Canadians lost 800,000 units of affordable housing. That is close to a million units. A million families or individuals could have had access to housing that they do not have now. What is their solution today? It is more market-driven solutions. Let us be clear: It is the market-driven solutions that the government had relied on that got us here today. Nowhere do the Conservatives in their plans talk about building social housing or co-op housing. The Liberal program does not talk about affordability. How strange is it? What planet do we live on that we operate in this way? It is no wonder we have a housing crisis. The bill that the government has tabled on the GST piece is to facilitate more housing being built. I want to be clear that we need more housing, but we also need to make sure that the housing that is built is accessible to people, meaning that it is truly affordable for people. It is strange to me that the government decided in some weird, altered universe, in this bill, that it would exclude co-ops from accessing the GST exemption. Why on earth would one do that? It makes no sense whatsoever. The co-op program, as indicated, is a proven model in the delivery of housing in our communities. Co-ops create communities within communities. One can see it when walking into a co-op housing project. One can see the love within the community and the supports that are there for each other. People take care of each other and they build community with each other. To not support co-ops makes no sense. The NDP will absolutely be moving amendments to address that issue. The other piece the NDP will doing is calling on the government to amend the bill to allow for existing non-profit housing projects to access this exemption. This would allow for some projects to become viable and, in other instances, for projects to create better affordability for the communities in need. That is what we need to do, to work towards, in that direction. We also need to actually set up some level of eligibility criteria in terms of affordability, to make sure the private developers are not just going to get a benefit but that there is also a further return to the community, and that is on the affordability criteria. We have to think about housing in a holistic way. The NDP is putting forward these ideas. Above all else, we need the government to build social housing and co-op housing like we used to. Housing is for people to live in and not just to make a profit from.

Madam Speaker, where the NDP is at is this: Unlike the Conservatives, New Democrats are here to fight for the people and to get more for the people. We are not just here to talk about how great we are and then deliver nothing, having been part of a previous administration that cut housing programs for the people in need. We are creating affordability through different means, and that is why we fought tooth and nail to get the dental care plan. Yes, the leader of the Conservatives has had access to dental care services all his life through the public service, but most Canadians do not. We will fight tooth and nail on affordability on all fronts.

Madam Speaker, for the federal government to make available federal lands for the development of housing, first and foremost, we need to ensure there is a public return to the community. The Conservatives do not want to put any requirements in place, because they only want to line the pockets of their pals, the investors and developers. For the NDP, there has to be a return to the community. In the spirit of reconciliation, we have to make land available by returning land back to indigenous people, first and foremost. Second, for buildings that are made available for development, to turn it into social housing, it has to be social or co-op housing. The rents have to be reduced to below market, so that people can access it and it is truly affordable for the community.

Madam Speaker, there is no question that the urgency is real. This housing crisis is a chronic crisis. It has been more than 30 years since the government walked away from building social and co-op housing. To speak to the member's point, it can be done. We just need the political will to do so and for government to say that it will build social and co-op housing, with the models it used to use. When veterans returned from the war, we built victory homes; Canada, at that time, said it would not allow—

Mr. Speaker, Canadians are struggling to keep a roof over their heads, whether they are seniors being renovicted, people who are unhoused and in an encampment or young families dreaming of owning their own home. The Liberals claim that they want to see more affordable homes built faster, yet they have rejected offers of municipal land and provincial and territorial money from British Columbia and Nunavut to build homes. Talk is cheap. Empty promises will not house people. Will the Prime Minister commit to funding these projects to build homes that families desperately need?

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for calling out the Azerbaijani government on the outrageous humanitarian crisis happening right now. The Armenian National Committee of Canada has written to members of Parliament raising its concerns. Everyone is watching the situation very carefully. I am pleased that the member and my other colleague have written to the minister and brought this issue to the government's attention. To that end, given the urgency of the situation, has the minister or any of the government members responded to that letter?

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting. The member actually mentioned the program for co-ops in budget 2022. As it stands right now, not one penny has rolled out of that budget measure. In fact, there is not even an agreement with the co-op sector to roll that money out. Aside from that, with respect to this bill, why did the government explicitly exclude co-ops from accessing the exemption for the GST in the bill?

Mr. Speaker, what happened last Friday never should have happened. Turning now to another crisis, the last 30 years have demonstrated that successive Liberal and Conservative governments' market-driven approach to housing has failed Canadians. Housing serves as a social good. It should not just be treated as a commodity for greater profits. People need housing that they can afford, and waiving the GST for new rentals is not enough. Will the Prime Minister commit to creating an acquisition fund for the non-profit sector to help stop the loss of low-cost rentals to profiteering landlords?

Mr. Speaker, then the minister should commit to creating an acquisition fund. Let me say this: The Liberal plan is not working. The minister should know that relying on market forces will not solve the problem. That is what the Liberals and Conservatives have done for the last 30 years, and we can see where it got us. The average rent in Canada is now over $2,100 a month. In Vancouver, it is over $3,000. It is time for bold action. Will the minister commit to building two million units of social housing to meet the needs of the community?

Mr. Speaker, Conservatives and Liberals caused the housing crisis by cancelling the national co-op and social housing program 30 years ago. Canada is now among the lowest of the G7 countries in social housing stock. Seniors, families and everyday Canadians need a home that they can afford. Under the Liberals' national housing strategy, it will take at least 125 years to build the community housing that we need. Talk is cheap. Bold action is needed. Will the Liberals put people before profits and commit to building two million units of co-op and social housing?

Mr. Speaker, as indicated by many in this House, we are faced with a climate crisis. In my community in British Columbia we are seeing forest fires. We are seeing catastrophe happening right before our eyes. We know that this has impacted the Atlantic provinces as well, so we are not spared, and this is the reality we are faced with. One of the questions I keep on wondering about is in terms of the action from the government. For the workers who are in the energy sector, the assurance that needs to be given to them is a pathway to an alternative energy and to different infrastructure building. Will the government support a jobs guarantee for the workers in the energy sector and in other energy infrastructure development in Canada? That way, we could transition people smoothly into the sector and ensure that the good-paying union jobs are secured for them and their families.

Madam Chair, as we know, the issue of foreign interference is real and is happening here in Canada. Earlier it was exposed through CSIS that there has been significant foreign interference from China, even targeting members of this Parliament. The latest revelation from the Prime Minister about India is particularly disturbing. This situation is very serious. People in my community in Vancouver and, I would say, across the nation are wanting to stand united to recognize the importance and significance of this issue. To that end, with respect to the public inquiry that is finally now before us, what message do we want to bring to the commissioner as the commissioner looks into foreign interference, most definitely interference from China but also this instance and other instances? What suggestions—

Madam Chair, I want to thank my colleague, the member for Edmonton Griesbach, for his powerful speech. I think it was a difficult speech to make, but what we need in the House more than ever is for us to speak truth to power and to challenge each other to stand up, because what is at stake is Canadians' safety and Canada's sovereignty. To that end, my question is this. The Conservatives feel that we must take on foreign interference with China. It follows, then, that if they want to ensure all Canadians are protected against foreign interference, should they not stand up in the House today in this take-note debate, join with all of us, the Liberals, the NDP and the Bloc, and stand united to send a clear message to the Indian government that we will not tolerate this kind of action and this kind of threat to Canadians? No matter where we come from and where we are in our communities today, we are united as one and we are all equals as Canadians.

Madam Chair, the minister is absolutely correct in indicating that multiculturalism and those of us who are immigrants helped build this country. We are equal partners in the sense that we make contributions while we also face challenges. We, of course, are living here on the lands of indigenous peoples, who have allowed us to be here as settlers. What is troubling me the most in this debate tonight is the fact that the leader of the Conservatives and the Conservative caucus want Canadians to believe that they are friends of the immigrant community, yet they are entirely silent. When the life of a member of our community has been lost, potentially at the hands of a foreign government, how is it that the Conservatives are silent in this debate? We know that foreign interference is a real threat in this country right now. Where are they for the immigrant community, who are Canadians here in Canada and have made Canada their home? When their lives are being threatened by a foreign government, why are the Conservatives not here to speak up and to challenge the Indian government, which may well be involved in the loss of life of a Canadian?

Madam Chair, I want to thank my leader, the leader of the NDP, for pointing out the work that needs to be done. I deeply appreciate the letter that has been sent to the commissioner to ensure the inquiry includes India. The Conservatives have been silent in this debate tonight. It is such a false pretense when they advance the notion that they believe in freedom and democracy everywhere, when they say they stand for human rights everywhere. A Canadian has been targeted and whose life has been lost, and we need more than ever for every member of this House to stand together united with one voice to send a clear message to the Indian government or any actors who threaten our sovereignty and the lives of Canadians in this way that we will not tolerate it. We need to be true to that calling of standing for freedom for everyone everywhere. When the Conservatives are absent in this, what message does the member think they are sending to the immigrant community, particularly to the Indo-Canadian community, who are now fearful of the situation and who fear their activism in the community and their fight for justice will be threatened?

Madam Chair, I want to thank my colleague for showing up at the one-year anniversary rally for the Iranian community. As we know, as parliamentarians, we use our words in this House to express our points of view, to bring forward the thoughts and visions of our communities and to advance the perspective of our communities in this Parliament. It is often said that words alone are not enough, and we support our words by our actions. Part of that, particularly in this take-note debate, is to show up in the House and participate in the debate. However, we have not seen the Conservatives engage in that way. The leader of the official opposition spent $3 million on a makeover, wanting Canadians to believe that he is somebody else. However, actions speak louder than words, and at this moment in time, the lack of participation by the Conservatives in this critical debate shows the true colour of who the Conservatives really are. Would the member not say this?

With regard to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation's (CMHC) insured mortgages, broken down by individual and corporate borrowers for each year since 2017, and by province: (a) how many mortgages have defaulted; (b) what was the value of the mortgages in (a); (c) how many times has CMHC had to repay a bank on behalf of the insured due to mortgage defaults; (d) how much have those defaults cost CMHC; and (e) how has the frequency of defaults increased or decreased, relative to the Bank of Canada interest rate adjustments?

Madam Speaker, people fearing gender-based persecution are adversely affected by the safe third country agreement. Today, the Supreme Court of Canada stated that equality rights are just as important as every other human right. Even the government's lawyers argued that an urgent exemption for migrant women, girls and 2SLGBTQIA+ people in the safe third country agreement is needed. Will the Liberals do the right thing and expand the exemption in the safe third country agreement for people fearing gender-based persecution?

Mr. Speaker, international students who were victims of unscrupulous immigration agents should not be punished. They have invested everything they have to study in Canada. They have contributed to the economic, cultural and social fabric of our community. Halting the deportation and removal orders is a good first step. The minister said that he is working on a long-term solution. However, what the students need is permanent residency status. Will the minister follow up to ensure that an alternate permanent residence pathway is made available to the victims of fraud?

Mr. Speaker, there is no question that there is a housing crisis from coast to coast to coast. In my own riding, Vancouver East, we had one of the largest homeless encampments, and when the encampment came about, there was neither a plan nor housing available to put people in. Consequently we were just moving people from one homeless space to another homeless space, which does not solve the problem. Part of the issue of the unaffordability of housing is the fact that people are treating housing as a commodity. They use it as an investment tool instead of recognizing that it is a basic human right. Would the member support the call for what the housing advocate is recommending to the government, which is to treat housing as a basic human right and not a commodity?

Mr. Speaker, I thought the member's comment about the importance of treating housing as a basic human right was absolutely dead on. However, the government has allowed for the corporate sector especially to come in and treat housing as a commodity, renovicting people, kicking people out, jacking up rent to make a larger profit and displacing people. Should the federal government stop this practice, stop treating housing as a commodity and treat it as a basic human right?

Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to enter this debate about housing, although, like my Bloc colleagues, I got notice that this would be up about 10 minutes before I walked into the House. I am always happy to talk about housing. What are we talking about here today? We are talking about the accelerator fund as it relates to the national housing strategy. The Conservatives will have people believe that the way to fix the problem is to say to local governments that we need to stop Nimbyism, as though that is the panacea to fixing the housing crisis. I agree we need to make sure communities do not engage in the not-in-my-backyard approach. I absolutely support that. I was a community legal advocate before I got to this place. For all those years, we were fighting for treating housing as a basic human right for people and calling on local governments to ensure that social housing, co-op housing, was built. When we build this kind of housing in a community, it does not make communities worse. In fact, it makes our communities better, as we are supporting each other and ensuring that people have a place to call home and a place they can afford. On the local government side, the Nimbyism issue that needs to be tackled is not the only issue. It is very interesting to me that the Conservatives are completely silent on an equally significant issue for local governments, that is, the issue of gentrification. What is gentrification? It is basically developers coming in who want to push out existing residents to get them out of a community. They buy up the stock and develop it into luxury condos, and as a result, people do not have safe, affordable homes to live in anymore. That has added to the housing crisis, no question. I was on the ground in the community watching that take place. In fact, that was one of the reasons that propelled me into electoral politics, along with the federal government in 1993 cancelling the national affordable housing program. What was the effect of that? Canada, after all those years, lost more than half a million units, which is an underestimation, of social housing or co-op housing that could otherwise have been built had the national affordable housing program not been cancelled by the federal Liberals. I should add this by way of context. Before the national housing program was cancelled in 1993 by the federal Liberals, the Conservatives were in government. What did they do? They gutted funding for the national affordable housing program significantly. The dip in the development of housing went down so deep that it was devastating to see on the ground. I was working as a legal advocate helping people find housing and have their basic rights honoured, and then in one fell swoop, the situation got so bad that people in our community were rendered homeless literally overnight. We were seeing that on the ground. Then we saw gentrification coming in and pushing people out so they could not stay in the housing they needed. What is happening today with that gentrification process? As it happens, we are now seeing corporations coming in, and not just on the development side. They are also sweeping up existing affordable housing stock. If we look at some of the websites for real estate investment trusts, for example, we see they explicitly say what their purpose is. Their purpose is to purchase up what they call “undervalued assets” or “undervalued properties”. That is the lower-cost housing in the private sector. They buy up this housing stock, and then what do they do? They renovict people. They push people out and they jack up the rent. We saw rents go up from what was affordable, like $750, for example, to $2,500. That is the trend we are seeing. We are seeing rental increases expand and increase exponentially. In the face of all of that, when the federal government walked away from housing, we started to see the private sector swoop in and purchase this affordable housing stock. We saw those numbers increase steadily. The federal government aided and abetted that process by giving the sector preferential tax treatment. These real estate investment trusts do not pay the corporate tax rate even though they operate as though they are corporations. When they do not pay the tax rate, it only encourages them to get into that market to displace people. Not only that, CMHC, the government's own agency, also helped them finance their projects with mortgage insurance, low-interest loans, and so on. It helped finance the corporate players in displacing tenants and jacking up their rents. That is what is happening. We saw this escalation in the crisis we are living in today in our communities, where people cannot access safe, secure and affordable housing. If we listen to the Liberals and Conservatives, they will barely talk about the fact that housing is being treated as a commodity. They will not even acknowledge the fact that this special tax treatment needs to stop. Why are real estate investment trusts getting this special tax treatment? Just for context, over the years the seven largest real estate investment trusts, as a result of this special tax treatment, did not pay taxes into the general revenues of the federal government to the tune of $1.5 billion. The Parliamentary Budget Officer just did another report to indicate that over the next four years taxpayers in Canada will lose another $300 million. That is a gift to the corporate sector to renovict people, displace people, jack up the rents and escalate the housing crisis. Why on earth would we do that? The Liberals and the Conservatives allowed that to happen and are all silent about it. They say that they cannot talk about it because the private sector has a role to play. Yes, it does. I will tell members what role it has to play: to stop displacing people, renovicting people, jacking up the rents and escalating the housing crisis that we are faced with today. If it does not come to the table willingly, the government has to take action. That is what the NDP has been calling for. I came from a municipal government, a provincial government, and I am now here at the federal level. When I was at the provincial level, the federal government had walked away. B.C. and Quebec were the only two provinces that continued to do housing on their own without the federal government. I will tell members what British Columbia did. We took our resources and leveraged money from the non-profit sector, some of which had land, and the faith communities, some of which had resources. We leveraged that. We went to the local governments and said that we the province would work in partnership with them to build social and co-op housing for the community if they gave us city land for free. We also said to the developers that if they wanted a rezoning done we wanted them to also provide a community return. In fact, city council could consider upzoning a project on the proviso that they also built social housing. We the province partnered with the private sector in doing some of that and instead of building one building, it built two. It paid for the construction, and then the province came in and provided the subsidies to operate those projects. Instead of the 700 units that we would have built with the federal government's funding, we moved that number to 1,200. Then we moved it to 1,900. Under the NDP, we leveraged and worked in partnership with the private and non-profit sectors and the local government when the federal government walked away. It is so important for the federal government to play a real leadership role. Yes, they did announce a national housing strategy is 2017, but that strategy has not worked in developing the necessary housing. It is not just me who is saying it. There is actually a full report from the Auditor General indicating that the federal government does not even know what kind of housing it builds. It has no idea what the level of affordability is for the units that were built. CMHC, at the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, came to the committee to answer some questions. It actually said that it does not track it. What exactly is it doing if it does not track the affordability of the housing units that it funds? It says, oh, it is not its job. It is infrastructure's job. It is someone else's job. I thought I heard the government say that it takes a whole-of-government approach to address the housing crisis. Why are they all asleep at the switch? Nobody is taking responsibility and all of them are saying, no, not me. In the meantime, what is happening? The sad reality is this: people are losing homes. People do not have access to housing. People are displaced. People are living in tents. Come to my community in Vancouver East, in the Downtown Eastside. The crisis is right there before our eyes. Do not tell me that they are getting to us, that it is going to take 10 years. The government's own homelessness targets are to reduce homelessness by 50% in 10 years. Yippee, that is going to work for the people who are sleeping on the streets right now. Not only that, it is not even going to meet that poor target. That has been established, not by the NDP but by the independent officer of the House. That is what is going on, as to the magnitude of the crisis. In the meantime, we have the private sector coming in, buying up low-cost rental apartments, sweeping them up and then pushing people out. Just to put this into context, for members to think about this number, for every one unit of social housing or co-op housing that is built, we lose 15. How can we make up for that loss? The only way one can do it is to stop the commodification of housing, the profiteering of housing. Put a moratorium in place for the financialization of housing. Create an acquisition fund for the non-profit sector in land trusts, so they could be the ones to go into the market to buy the private housing that is coming onto the market and to retain it, so that we can hold onto the stock for the community. Put people before profits. That is what we need to do. I would also add that there are other measures we need to put in place. There is zero justification whatsoever for CMHC and the government to help finance these corporate players who are coming in to displace people. If we are going to partner with them, and we can, as I am not saying we should not, there has to be a return tied to it. There has to be a no-displacement policy in place. There has to be affordability tied into it so that when they get something from the taxpayers, whether it be insuring their mortgage or any of the benefits that they get, they need to give a return back to the community. We also need to ensure that there is a level of affordability, so that the rent they charge the tenants needs to be below market. We have to make sure that this is held in perpetuity, so that it is not just a one-time thing. We need to put these measures and policies in place for a return. One does not get access to taxpayer funds and support doing harm to the community. There has to be a return to help the community, to support the community. In the case of housing, there have to be these measures of no displacement, of affordability in perpetuity, as an example. There is another thing that would help a lot. Do members know how many tenants I talk to who do not even know who their landlord is? These corporate players hide behind numbered companies because the truth is they cannot show their faces. They do not want people to know that they are the ones who are actually jacking up the rent and displacing people. We need to ensure that there is disclosure of all landlords. There should be information in public records so people know who their landlords are. People have the right to know who they are renting from. That is another measure that the federal government can take. We need to stop the preferential tax treatments, stop giving them a benefit, make them pay their fair share and invest that money in the development of true social and co-op housing. That is what the NDP would like to see.

Mr. Speaker, there is no question that we need the federal government's leadership. The federal government used to develop social housing and co-op housing; it did so really well. We used to provide subsidies to ensure that rent was low. We would partner with the local governments, the provincial governments and the non-profit sector. That is what we need to get back to. Right now, the program that the federal government has in place is ineffective; if we truly hope to treat housing as a basic human right, the government needs to make more investments into housing to address the housing crisis.

Mr. Speaker, my phone is not near the microphone. On the issue around local governments making decisions with rezoning and the question around nimbyism, that is a real problem. I think local politicians just need to take a deep breath and say to those communities, as I did when I was a municipal councillor, we need this housing done. Any time we had social housing development come forward, I voted for it and I spoke for it vociferously because it is the right thing to do. It is important for an election, for people to support politicians who will get the job done. The government can use incentives and disincentives to motivate that process as well. On the question of development cost charges, the development cost charges are fees that are necessary. Let us be clear that the developer will work out its pro forma and determine what it can and cannot do. Local governments can look at that issue as it ties to the zoning. Literally by the flick of a pen and by signing that signature, the government is giving money to the developers. What is the return? The return is also in community amenities, whether in green spaces, social housing or other community amenities that are necessary. Let us just remember this: Developers should not get a free pass. They should pay their fair share. Let us make sure local governments know the strength and power that they have in yielding that return to the community.

Mr. Speaker, I am so glad the member asked the question. Dental care is absolutely essential, because it is part of our health care system. However, the NDP did not just ask for dental care; we absolutely asked for housing investments as well. The NDP is not in government, although I know people think we are. However, we are leveraging our power to push and to force the government to take action. With respect to the housing file, while we asked for the government to provide, for example, a permanent program for the rapid housing initiative, to inject funds into the co-development fund and a number of other measures, what we were able to get out of all our asks with respect to housing was the investment in an urban-rural northern housing strategy. In budget 2022, we were able to secure $300 million; in budget 2023, we secured $4 billion over seven years. Finally, for distinction-based funding for indigenous communities, we were able to secure $4 billion over seven years in budget 2022. Is it enough? No, it is not. Are we going to continue to fight for more? We absolutely are.

Mr. Speaker, the provinces obviously have a role to play; they need to do so, although some provinces choose not to. However, of the provinces that do play a role, in the case of British Columbia, for example, the NDP B.C. government actually created an acquisition fund to buy up housing stock that came onto the market to house people who are homeless and do not have access to housing. We wanted the federal government to partner with us. Would the federal government do that? No, it would not. Right now, in my riding, there is a site, 105 Keefer Street, where a developer wants to build luxury condos in a low-income area in Chinatown. The community wants the federal government to partner with the provincial government and the city government to do a land swap. Then, we could take that site to develop social housing to meet the needs of the community, particularly for seniors living in Chinatown in deplorable housing conditions. That is what we need the federal government to do to be a true partner at the table.

Mr. Speaker, if I were the minister of housing, we would have taken action long ago. In fact, I would not have eliminated the national affordable housing program back in 1993, which caused the escalating problems of the housing crisis that we are faced with today. I cannot speak for the Liberals on why they would not take these measures. The only reason that I could guess at is that it is because of those very insider friends that they have. Perhaps that is what is immobilizing the Liberals from taking action. The other possibility, of course, is that, here in the House of Commons, the Minister of Housing is using housing as an investment tool. Perhaps he has a blind spot in looking at the true situation as it is and making sure that housing is not treated as a commodity.

Mr. Speaker, people are struggling to pay their rent, buy groceries and afford their medication. I have met seniors who are taking their pills every other day or cutting them in half to make them last longer. Today, New Democrats introduced a plan to help Canadians afford their prescription drugs. The Liberals have been promising pharmacare for 25 years, without acting. People are counting on the current government to make life more affordable, but it is letting them down. Will the Liberals finally support the NDP's plan for universal pharmacare to help Canadians make ends meet?

Madam Speaker, I am happy to rise to enter into debate with respect to Bill S-8. People may ask what Bill S-8 would do. The bill would make changes to sanctions related to immigration enforcement by bringing the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act into line with the SEMA. It would make sanctioned individuals, including previously sanctioned individuals, inadmissible to Canada. Ukraine has also asked Canada to take this step with regard to Russians on our sanctions list. At present, the great breach of international peace and security is the primary mechanism that Canada is sanctioning Russian individuals under, and that does not currently trigger the inadmissibility provisions. That is why we have Bill S-8 before us, which is meant to fix this. I should note, though, that what Bill S-8 would not do is address the absence of parliamentary oversight of our sanctions regime or enforcement in areas that are not immigration related; that is, the seizing of assets. Therefore, a lot of work needs to be done to fix our sanctions regime if Bill S-8 is to pass. The bill would not fix the challenge of clarity either, for example, why the government adds some names but not others and for what reasons. Further, public communication and access to sanction lists is still subpar. We need a comprehensive review of Canada's sanctions regime. The NDP has proposed a study at the foreign affairs committee on Canada's sanctions regime, and we hope that study will take place this winter. Canada's foremost expert on sanctions policy, Andrea Charron, has said: While there is nothing wrong with highlighting in the Immigration and Refugee Act that inadmissibility due to sanctions is possible, this repeats a pattern whereby Canada tinkers on the margins of legislation without addressing core policy and process issues. If we are to continue to sanction autonomously with allies, we need to fix fundamental issues of policy and process. This has been put on the public record by experts, so the bill is a step in the right direction, to be sure. We are debating a bill that is supported by all the parties in the House, but what is happening is the Conservatives are trying to use parliamentary tools to delay progress of the work in the House. Not only are we debating this bill that everybody supports and wants to get done, but the Conservatives have moved an amendment to change the title of the bill. This is a tactic. In fact, at this moment, what we are technically debating is a motion to change the title of the bill. I have seen this play over and over again in this Parliament. Last week, we had debate on the child care bill. What did the Conservatives want to do? We were debating the child care bill until midnight, a bill that we wanted to move forward to ensure that child care provisions were made available to Canadians. Instead of doing that, we were debating a motion to change the title of the bill. That is what we are doing again. I find it distressing that those are the tactics on which the Conservatives repeatedly rely. The sole purpose of that is not to talk about the substance of the issues and the importance of the issue and how we can improve the legislation or how we can improve the situation for the people who need the changes, but, rather, it is a tactic that is deployed by the Conservatives to upset progress in the House, all for partisan politics. It is all for the Conservatives' own political motivation. It has nothing to do with the work that is really important for the people. With respect to the issue around sanctions, why is this so important? We need to ensure that inadmissibility is in place. We are talking about Russians who have waged this illegal war against Ukrainians. We are also talking about other countries that are faced with sanctions as well. However, the ineffectiveness of our sanction regime has been highlighted over and over again. In addition to the inadmissibility piece, we need to also look at the issue around sanctioning that applies to assets as well. So far, what we have seen with respect to that arena is that very little effort has been made. It has not been effective. We are now talking about foreign interference as it relates to China. For members of Parliament, including myself, who have been targeted by the Communist Chinese Party, there is a question about sanctions applying to China as well that needs to be in play. There are a number of different countries for which we need an effective sanctioning regime. I would urge the members of the House, the Conservatives included, to stop playing games. Let us get on with the work. We are here to do this work and move forward. It is important to pass this bill and bring forward accountability measures for sanctioning regimes.

Madam Speaker, as I mentioned, we need to actually get the proper sanction regime and one that is effective. Bill S-8 is a step in the right direction. Canada plays an important role, not just in the situation with Russia but for other countries as well, such as addressing, for example, Iran, the Iranian regime and the atrocious human rights violations. We need to bring those measures in place for other countries, such as South Sudan, Syria, Venezuela, Zimbabwe, and I could go on with a list. It is very important for Canada to get our sanctions regime in order.

Madam Speaker, there is much work to be done. Of course, my colleague, the member for Edmonton Strathcona, is the foreign affairs critic. She has been doing this important work at committee. She intends to bring forward additional work through the committee. I hope that the motions she will be bringing forward, the ideas that she has proposed on the floor there, are followed up on and studies are completed, so we can move forward in completing this important work. It does not matter what party we are talking about. We are talking about human rights and it is above partisan politics. Let us put our minds and hearts together to do the right thing.

Madam Speaker, that is precisely it. Some parties in the House are filibustering debate. What we are talking about here is a motion to change the title, adding time to the debate so that we are taking away important time to deal with other issues. This is repeated ad nauseam, over and again, to the point where we have to move forward on things, for example, the budget bill, to ensure that people get the dental care supports they need and the various other supports included in the budget. That is the reality. We do not like to cut off debate, but in the face of some parties wanting to play partisan games and delaying the passage of important bills, we have no other choice. We have to get the job done. Therefore, I urge all members of the House to stop playing games. Let us get on with the job we are supposed to be here to do and get the bills passed. If members have legitimate questions to ask, they should ask them and debate them, not play games to delay the passage of bills for the purpose of partisan politics.

Mr. Speaker, international students who have been defrauded by crooked consultants should not be punished with deportation and inadmissibility based on misrepresentation. They have invested everything they have for a better future. They work hard and study hard, and they do so under very difficult conditions. They are under enormous strain, and their lives are in limbo. The Liberals can eliminate this uncertainty by allowing them to stay in Canada and build the lives they dream of. Will the minister do the right thing, the compassionate thing, and grant these international students a pathway to permanent residency?

Madam Speaker, as the member indicated, one of the issues that I certainly have a lot of problems with, in terms of the government's inaction, is Afghans who served Canada, who helped Canada to fulfill its missions, now have been left behind. Particularly, their family members and their loved ones have been left behind. The government put in an arbitrary quota for the number of Afghans who can be brought to Canada, to safety. Would the member support the NDP's call for the government to lift the cap?

Madam Speaker, the issue around Afghans and bringing them to safety is something that is top of mind for many of us. In fact, just outside of West Block, there is an individual whose family members are being left behind. He was someone who served Canada, but is still not able to bring his loved ones here. The government put a cap on the number of Afghans, who had helped serve Canada to complete our missions. As a result, many people have not been able to bring their loved ones to safety. Would the member support the call that the government should lift that arbitrary cap that it put in place?