Canadians Don’t Need More Liberal Homebuilding Illusions
Ottawa, ON – Scott Aitchison, Conservative Shadow Minister for Housing, issued the following statement on the Liberals’ recent funding announcement for the City of Toronto:
“Mark Carney promised to build half a million homes a year and get new housing built at record speeds. But, after a year and a half in office, Canada is barely building half that number and now has the second-slowest housing approvals in the entire OECD.
“Today’s announcement to build infrastructure that is already underway does little to incentivize the homebuilding Torontonians so desperately need. Instead, Liberals are again rewarding gatekeepers who have driven up development charges, blocked permits and made housing more expensive.
“In Toronto, development charges on a new single-family home have skyrocketed from $35,648 to $137,846, an increase of 286 per cent since 2015. Over the same period, overall Canadian inflation increased by 33 per cent. After allowing city gatekeepers to increase the cost of homebuilding, the federal Liberals are now asking taxpayers to reward Toronto for only partially reversing it.
“This is one of a long string of Liberal half-measures where decisive change is needed. When Carney announced his one-year HST pause for new Ontario homes back in March, Conservatives said that a temporary break for a single province would do little to create the long-term conditions we need to boost homebuilding. Instead, the Liberals’ boutique exemption is predicted to add only 8,000 additional starts in a province of over 16 million people.
“We are calling on the government to implement the entire Conservative housing plan, including cutting the GST on all new homes in all provinces under $1.3 million, reducing development charges, rewarding municipalities that approve more housing and unlocking billions in private investment for homebuilding.
“We also call on the Liberals to support Conservative MP Brad Redekopp’s Housing Cost Transparency Act, which will require the National Research Council to publicly disclose the real-world costs, delays and affordability impacts of proposed building code changes before they are imposed.
“Conservatives will restore the Canadian promise of homeownership by getting government out of the way and letting builders build, so that every hard-working Canadian family can have a place to call their own on a safe street under a proud flag.”