Carney’s housing platform misses the mark, critics say

A taxpayers group is raising the alarm about Liberal Leader Mark Carney’s housing plan.

Source: Facebook

A taxpayers group is raising the alarm about Liberal Leader Mark Carney’s housing plan.

Carney held a press conference in Vaughan, Ontario where he promised to double the pace of housing construction to 500,000 new builds per year by creating a government entity to act as a developer for affordable homes and provide financing for prefabricated modular homes.

“We’re getting government back in the business of building affordable homes,” said Carney.

Carney promised to work with provinces and municipalities to cut development charges in half by 2030 for multi-unit housing, committing to provide municipalities funds for the lost revenue.

He also promised to keep and reinforce the Trudeau government’s housing accelerator fund, a controversial policy widely panned for its inefficacy.

The Montreal Economic Institute’s senior policy analyst Gabriel Giguère said that Carney’s housing strategy misses the mark, failing to learn from the mistakes of the Trudeau government.

“Creating a new federal housing developer misses the point of how we got into this crisis,” said Giguère.

“The private sector has been ready and willing to build the supply we need without taxpayer dollars, but Canadian cities across the country bury developers in so much red tape that housing projects become unfeasible.”

Giguère encouraged the government to focus on eliminating tax and regulatory barriers to housing development instead of another government-led approach.

“Cutting development taxes, speeding up approvals, and getting out of the way would do far more to improve affordability than launching yet another expensive government program,” said Giguère.

Federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation Franco Terrazzano reiterated a similar message, urging the government to get out of the way of builders.

“If more government was the solution to the housing crisis, then every Canadian would have two homes by now,” said Terrazzano.

“We don’t need more government, we need governments to get out of the way and let people build homes. The best way for all levels of government to get more homes built is to massively cut taxes and the red tape that is making it way too difficult to build homes in Canada.”

Terrazzano added that the federal government already has a corporation dedicated to housing – the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation.

He criticizes the crown corporation for failing to achieve its goal of “housing affordability for all” while dishing out $132 million in bonuses to CMHC staff since 2020.

Carney has already committed to eliminating the goods and services tax on first-time home buyers on homes under $1 million, a policy remarkably similar to Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s commitment to axe the federal sales tax on newly built homes, unveiled nearly six months ago.

Poilievre has since upped his commitment to axe the GST on newly built homes up to $1.3 million.