“Homelessness & Affordability Crisis”

Growing up part of the Canadian generation born to baby boomers, I heard the phrase “wartime housing” spoken of both mythically and practically. Mythically, because it evoked a time when an incredible amount of housing seemed to be created almost overnight. Practically, because such housing could be found in cities across Canada, providing good shelter for people and families — then and for multiple generations since.

More than 30,000 homes were built in Canada, a large impact when the population was much smaller. This kind of housing was, and still is, an integral part of the urban fabric.

American economist Thomas Sowell once said that “there are no solutions, only trade-offs.” That is, dealing with a problem entails making a choice, and doing so entails forgoing the alternatives.

For example, damming a river to protect a town from seasonal flooding means accepting that a reservoir will form on other side of the dam. The reservoir – and all it may entail for its natural surroundings – is deemed preferable to the potential damage that yearly flooding would do to the town.

HALIFAX – Cities across Canada are reporting a rise in fires, sometimes deadly, in tents and other shelters used by unhoused people — a situation advocates say is a tragic consequence of the country’s homelessness crisis.

As the number of homeless people continues to rise — and the frigid weather sets in — it’s inevitable there will be more accidental fires, Tim Richter, president and CEO of the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness, said in an interview Wednesday.

“If all you can get your hands on is a propane tank or a camp stove, you’ll use that to survive because the alternative is freezing to death,” said Richter, whose group estimates there are between 260,000 and 300,000 unhoused people across the country.

Ottawa will revamp a Second World War-era housing plan to speed up the pace of home building in Canada, Housing Minister Sean Fraser says.

Fraser on Tuesday confirmed Global News’ report from Monday that the federal government was dusting off a program nearly 80 years ago run by what was at the time known as Wartime Housing Limited to provide standardized housing blueprints to builders.

All the LPC’s projects are defeated before the first shovel is picked up.

Unless they turn off the mass immigration spigot not one will have an appreciable impact.

The government rang up a $769-million bill to provide free hotel rooms and meals for refugees and illegal immigrants this year, according to the Department of Immigration.

Rows of tiny cabins across a Kitchener, Ont., neighbourhood have been catching the eye of several communities across the province that’ve begun duplicating the model, hoping to bridge the gap between homelessness and permanent housing.

A Better Tent City (ABTC) co-founder and chair Jeff Wilmer says compassion from the community, support from city politicians and the local public school board made their small community possible, and it’s inspiring copies across the province.

Before Justin Trudeau became Prime Minister of Canada, he released a lengthy video on his “sunny ways” philosophy. While those two words quickly became Trudeau’s trademark, the video detailed how the phrase actually came from Wilfird Laurier, who had served as Liberal PM of Canada a century earlier.

It was a whimsical video full of cartoon images that told a narrative about the history of the country and Trudeau’s vision for it. The video—and the announcement of the “sunny ways” agenda—received a great deal of attention at the time.

More and bigger homeless encampments have been set up across Canada recently and, with the help of advocacy groups, they’re taking on a more permanent feel.

Hunkering down for the winter, some have generators, heating stoves, winterized tents, and more. Advocacy groups have helped them obtain these supplies, along with legal help to stop attempts at moving them.

Pierre Poilievre’s 15-minute advertisement masquerading as a mini-documentary on the housing crisis contains inaccuracies and distortions. That doesn’t matter. The thing is a work of genius.

The Conservative Leader has taken ownership of an issue critically important to many Canadians: the seeming impossibility of ever being able to afford a home, or even rent one.

Poilievre now owns the housing issue — the most important issue to most voters — and the Liberals are seen as culpable for presiding over a hot mess

Housing hell: How we got here and how we get out. pic.twitter.com/vVLsXMVM35

— Pierre Poilievre (@PierrePoilievre) December 2, 2023

Neither Ivison or Poilievre mentions the Liberal party’s destructive mass immigration policy and its role in the housing crisis. Silence is complicity.

OTTAWA – Every week now for more than a month, cabinet ministers have been appearing in front of cameras on Parliament Hill in an effort to convince Canadians that the Liberal government has the housing crisis in hand.

Ever since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s summer cabinet shuffle, they’ve been scrambling to be seen making the cost of living a top priority, hoping to catch up to the runaway Conservatives on the issue of affordability.

Like clockwork, Housing Minister Sean Fraser appeared Tuesday alongside Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, this time to announce millions in spending to build or upgrade thousands of co-operative homes.

A new 15-minute video produced by Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is the latest salvo in the political fight over housing policy, which has dominated the second half of this year in politics.

Poilievre made housing costs and affordability a key part of his message early in his leadership run, and housing has now become an issue that parties across the political spectrum agree is a crisis facing Canadians.

Thank you to the 2 million people who have watched “Housing Hell” on X in the last 36 hours.pic.twitter.com/vVLsXMVM35

— Pierre Poilievre (@PierrePoilievre) December 4, 2023