Bill C-356

Building Homes Not Bureaucracy Act

An Act respecting payments by Canada and requirements in respect of housing and to amend certain other Acts

This enactment enacts the Building Homes Not Bureaucracy Act in order to
(a) establish a target for the completion of new homes in high-cost cities that increases 15% every year and ties federal infrastructure funding allocated to high-cost cities to that target;
(b) provide for the reallocation of $100 million from the Housing Accelerator Fund to municipalities that greatly exceed housing targets;
(c) require that federal transit funding provided to certain cities be held in trust until high-density residential housing is substantially occupied on available land around federally funded transit projects’ stations; and
(d) make it a condition for certain cities to receive federal infrastructure and transit funding that they not unduly restrict or delay the approval of building permits for housing.
It also amends the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation Act , the National Housing Act and the Excise Tax Act in order to
(a) eliminate executive bonuses unless housing targets are met and to reduce executive compensation if applications for funding for new housing construction are not treated within an average of 60 days; and
(b) provide a 100% GST rebate on new residential rental property for which the average rent payable is below market rate.
In addition, this enactment requires the Minister of Public Works to table a report on the inventory of federal buildings and land, to identify land suitable for housing construction and to propose a plan to sell at least 15% of any federal buildings and all land that would be appropriate for housing construction, subject to certain exceptions. Finally, it requires the Minister of Public Works to place these properties on the market within 12 months of tabling the report.

The House resumed from May 27 consideration of the motion that Bill C-356, An Act respecting payments by Canada and requirements in respect of housing and to amend certain other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Housing

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, when I was the minister responsible, the cost of housing was half of what it is today.

The Prime Minister has not only doubled the cost of housing, he is spending money on growing the very bureaucracy that is blocking construction. I have a common-sense plan in Bill C‑356, which we will be voting on this afternoon. We are going to cut construction taxes, sell federal land and buildings to build housing, and offer big bonuses to municipalities that allow more and faster housing construction.

Will he vote for more housing?

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

This morning I was in the House, and there was a debate around Bill C-356. It's the Leader of the Opposition's bill, which would actually essentially put a tax, the GST, back on apartment building homes. Would that have a negative impact on the sector if it does pass?

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Mr. Speaker, our government tabled a plan to free up 250,000 new housing units by 2031 on federal, provincial, territorial and municipal public lands.

The Conservative leader has debated his housing plan, Bill C‑356, which will sell federal buildings to the highest bidder with no guarantee of affordable housing.

Can the public works minister explain to Canadians how our federal land conservation plan will create affordable housing across the country?

[Joanne Thompson, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

Mr. Speaker, today, the House is debating Bill C-356, the Conservative leader's housing proposal. In the Conservative leader's bill, there is no mention of students, seniors, workers or the most vulnerable in the country.

Could the Deputy Prime Minister please tell Canadians what our plan focuses on, how we are working to create more affordable homes faster across Canada and how the Conservative leader's plan would slow down builders?

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our government presented Canadians with a housing plan that will increase the housing supply across the country. A core measure of the plan is the removal of GST from new apartments, student housing and co-operatives.

Earlier today, the House debated the Conservative leader's housing plan, Bill C-356. The bill would actually put the tax back on the construction of middle-class apartments.

Can the Minister of Housing tell Canadians where the government stands on the Conservative leader's plan to reimpose a rent tax on middle-class apartments?

Building Homes Not Bureaucracy Act

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-356 reiterates the Conservative leader's talking points about the housing crisis.

According to him, the municipalities are responsible for the housing crisis by tying up real estate development projects in supposedly needless red tape. One of the Conservatives' proposals is to set a target for increasing the number of housing starts. Beginning on April 1, 2024, the target would increase by 15% each year.

Bill C-356 places the entire blame for the housing shortage on the municipalities, even though the current crisis would not have been this severe had Ottawa not pulled out of funding for social housing under the Harper government.

Bill C-356 would in effect put municipalities under outside control by preventing them from taking measures to ensure a minimum of social housing or from protecting their built heritage, under penalty of having their funding reduced—including funding for the development of public transit.

In my riding of La Pointe-de-l'Île, I have met met many times with seniors, families and community associations and that has helped me realize the enormity of this tragedy. Expensive condos are already largely available on the market. What is sorely lacking is affordable housing. The resulting mad scramble for rentals betrays people's growing sense of despair. They feel that the government is doing nothing to help them.

The pressing issue is not to continue encouraging big real estate developers to participate in this frantic race, but rather to address the housing shortage affecting most low-income people. The Bloc Québécois has already made a wide range of proposals and interventions. For example, it is proposing that the federal government reorganize its funding for the various programs under the national housing strategy to create an acquisition fund. This kind of fund would enable co-operatives and non-profit organizations to acquire apartment buildings currently available on the private market, keep them affordable and convert them into social, community or deeply affordable housing units. For example, in my riding of La Pointe-de-l'Île, Corporation Mainbourg, in association with the Quebec government and the City of Montreal, acquired Domaine La Rousselière. This is a 720-unit complex that will be protected from the speculative market to ensure its long-term affordability will be maintained.

The Bloc Québécois has long said that the provinces and municipalities are in the best position to know the housing needs on their territory. It is not the federal government's place to interfere. I would remind members that housing is exclusively under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. Since 1973, Quebec law has prevented the federal government from negotiating directly with municipalities, and Bill C-356 would tear up that agreement. It would create a series of conflicts. It took two years to reach the agreement, and we cannot afford another two-year delay that will bring all projects to a halt. All of the interference brought in by Bill C-356 means that this irresponsible bill would create a breach that would foster sustained conflict and certainly paralyze every project, right in the middle of a housing crisis.

I would remind members that we welcomed the $3.7-billion Canada-Quebec housing agreement signed in 2020. Half of that money came from the federal government, but the negotiations took three years. The funding that was supposed to go to Quebec was blocked until the two levels of government came to an agreement. Had that happened in 2017, Quebec could have built and renovated many social and affordable housing projects since then, which would have helped mitigate the current housing crisis.

In closing, the Bloc Québécois deplores the federal government's constant need to spend its money, interfere in Quebec's jurisdictions and tell Quebec how to spend its money. We are asking that the federal government transfer its share with no strings attached. That is why we will be voting against Bill C-356.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I understand that there is a great deal of latitude in terms of how we address different speeches in this House. The issue at hand right now is housing, Bill C-356, a private member's bill brought forward by the hon. Leader of the Opposition.

The member is currently talking about provincial politics. That does not seem to fit within the scope of this bill. Furthermore, she is talking about some far alt-right conspiracy theory. Again, I am not sure how that fits within the scope of this bill.

I would ask you to make a ruling, Mr. Speaker, that would be most appropriate for this.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

The Chair has been very tolerant of the beginning of the hon. member's speech, but the Chair would appreciate it if the member would draw all this together with the private member's bill before the House at this time, Bill C-356.

[Sylvie Bérubé, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise this morning to speak to Bill C-356, an act respecting payments by Canada and requirements in respect of housing and to amend certain other acts, introduced by the leader of the official opposition.

On reading Bill C‑356, it is obvious that the bill blames the entire housing shortage on municipalities, but this crisis would not be nearly as serious as it is now if the federal government had not decided, under Harper, to withdraw funding for the construction of social housing.

The bill seeks to exercise control over the municipalities by preventing them from taking measures to protect their farmland, from setting a minimum percentage of social housing, or from protecting their built heritage, on pain of having their funding slashed, including funding for public transit development. This bill denies any federal responsibility in the matter and confirms that the Conservative Party will do nothing to address the crisis if it comes into power.

It is also a bill that offers no solutions. The market is not lacking in luxury condos. What is lacking is housing that people can afford. That is where the government should focus its efforts. This notion, however, is completely absent from the Conservative leader's vision. Bill C‑356 gives developers the keys to the city so they can build more condos that rent for $3,000 a month or more.

In short, the bill's solution to the housing crisis is to let the big real estate developers do anything, anywhere and anyhow. The populist solution offered by the bill ignores the fact that people do not only live in housing, but also in neighbourhoods and cities. That means they need infrastructure for water and sewers, for roads, and for public and private services, such as schools and grocery stores. Cities have a duty to ensure that their residents are well served and to lay down conditions.

This is also a bill that will cause bickering. As members know, since 1973, Quebec's Act respecting the Ministère du Conseil exécutif has prevented the federal government from dealing directly with Quebec municipalities. The Canada-Quebec infrastructure framework agreement reflects this reality, stipulating that the federal government has no right to intervene in the establishment of priorities. What Bill C‑356 would do is tear up this agreement. Although it took 27 months to negotiate the agreement, Bill C‑356 sets the stage for two years of bickering, during which all projects will be paralyzed. In the middle of a housing crisis, this would be downright disastrous.

If a municipality's housing starts do not increase as required by Ottawa, Bill C‑356 would cut its gas tax transfer and public transit transfer by 1% for every percentage point shortfall from the target the bill unilaterally sets. For example, in Quebec, housing starts are down 60% this year rather than up 15%, so transfers would have been reduced by about 75% if Bill C‑356 had been in effect. That is unacceptable.

Bill C‑356 goes even further by withholding funding for public transportation if cities do not achieve the 15% target it unilaterally sets. This policy would encourage car use, since transit would only be built after the fact, not in conjunction with new housing developments.

It is clear that Bill C‑356 is not a good solution to the housing crisis in Quebec and across Canada. As members know, the housing crisis currently plaguing Quebec, which was once known as one of the most affordable provinces, is not confined to large cities. It has been a problem in my region for more than 15 years. It has resulted in a shortage of housing units and restricted access to affordable housing.

In my riding, the housing crisis affects both availability and affordability. Prices are also limiting access to housing in the regions. Although the housing crisis initially affected mostly low-income households, it is now increasingly affecting companies' ability to recruit and retain employees.

I cannot help thinking of Nunavik, in my riding. Half of all Inuit in Nunavik live in overcrowded housing, and almost a third live in homes requiring major repairs. This overcrowding created serious issues during the pandemic. We even had to bar access to the communities to protect them from exposure to the virus.

The housing crisis in southern Quebec is nothing compared with the situation of Inuit communities in Nunavik, in the north. It is not unusual for five, six, seven or even eight people to live in a two-bedroom unit. If one of them has social issues, it impacts the entire family.

The housing problem in Nunavik is nothing new. There has been a housing shortage since 1990, when the federal government stopped funding construction for five years. Nunavik currently needs around 800 more social housing units.

The housing shortage in Nunavik has also been a long-standing obstacle for students. Its impact on students who live in cramped accommodations can be severe, since they have no place to study or do their homework in peace. In addition to affecting young people, the housing shortage and lack of infrastructure in Nunavik are having a significant impact on every aspect of education, notably the working conditions of local staff, the ability of school boards to hire and retain teachers, and the ability to offer specialized programs.

Students are not the only ones affected by the housing crisis. Entire families are impacted by toxic cohabitation. This is not something that is tracked in housing statistics, and it is often neglected in analyses of the crisis. It refers to couples who are separated but continue to live together because they cannot find another place to live. It also refers to households in which one member develops an alcohol or drug addiction, which can compromise the safety of the other members of the household.

Bill C-356 will certainly not remedy all these problems. However, the Bloc Québécois already has a vast array of potential solutions to suggest.

Let me name a few: that the federal government gradually reinvest in social, community and truly affordable housing until it reaches 1% of its total annual revenue to provide a consistent and predictable funding stream instead of ad hoc agreements; that all federal surplus priorities be repurposed for social, community and deeply affordable housing as a priority in an effort to address the housing crisis; that a tax be placed on real estate speculation to counter artificial overheating of the housing market; that the home buyers' plan be reformed to account for the increasingly different realities and family situations of Quebec households; that the federal government undertake a financial restructuring of programs under the national housing strategy to create an acquisition fund; that Quebec receive its fair share of funding, without conditions, from federal programs to combat homelessness, while also calling for the funding released in the last year of the pandemic to be made permanent.

The Leader of the Opposition should have based his bill and its wording on these sound proposals by the Bloc Québécois. A simple transfer to the Quebec government with no conditions attached would be ideal. Had this been done in 2017, Quebec could have built and renovated a number of social housing projects three years earlier. It certainly would have mitigated the housing crisis we are facing today. Unconditional transfers would make the funding process much simpler. In contrast, the various agreements add to the associated red tape and increase the wait time for actually collecting the sums in question. I would point out that the programs enacted by the Quebec government are often innovative and effective.

It must also be said that the Bloc Québécois has reiterated the need for federal funding to target first and foremost all the myriad needs for affordable social housing, as this is where the most pressing needs are.

Bill C-356 is not the way to go if we want to build housing and cut red tape. That is why we must vote against Bill C-356.

The House resumed from October 30, 2023, consideration of the motion that Bill C-356, An Act respecting payments by Canada and requirements in respect of housing and to amend certain other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Requirement of Royal Recommendation for Bill C-356—Speaker's Ruling

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The Chair is also ready to rule on the point of order raised on October 24, 2023, by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons concerning Bill C-356, An Act respecting payments by Canada and requirements in respect of housing and to amend certain other Acts, standing in the name of the member for Carleton.

On October 19, 2023, the Chair had also raised issues with this bill and invited members to make arguments on its need for it to be accompanied by a royal recommendation.

In raising his point of order, the parliamentary secretary argued that the bill would infringe on the Crown’s financial prerogative by repurposing $100 million from the housing accelerator fund and by implementing a 100% GST rebate on new residential rental property for which the average rent payable is below the market rate. Page 838 of House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, states:

A royal recommendation not only fixes the allowable charge, but also its objects, purposes, conditions and qualifications. For this reason, a royal recommendation is required not only in the case where money is being appropriated, but also in the case where the authorization to spend for a specific purpose is significantly altered. Without a royal recommendation, a bill that either increases the amount of an appropriation or extends its objects, purposes, conditions and qualifications is inadmissible on the grounds that it infringes on the Crown’s financial initiative.

Following a careful review of Bill C‑356, the Chair is preoccupied with some elements that would cause a withdrawal from the public treasury for new and distinct purposes.

The bill seeks, among other considerations, to authorize a minister to disburse up to $100 million to municipalities that surpass identified housing targets. This amount would be withdrawn directly from the consolidated revenue fund, although the bill requires a minister to table a plan to reallocate funds from the housing accelerator fund program to offset that amount. Moreover, the bill also proposes certain circumstances for which a 100% GST rebate on new residential rental property may be paid out.

The aforementioned elements would cause new and distinct charges against the consolidated revenue fund, thus constituting an infringement on the financial initiative of the Crown.

Accordingly, Bill C-356 must be accompanied by a royal recommendation, and without one, the Chair will not put the question at the third reading stage of the bill in its present form.

When this item is next before the House, the debate will continue on the motion for second reading of the bill and the question will be put to the House at the end of the debate.

I thank all members for their attention.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Right, thank you. In fact, it was an election promise made by the Liberal Party that we are still waiting to see come to fruition.

I asked the minister a question about this earlier. I think Bill C‑59 contains a lot of things relating to housing that seem to me to be similar to those we find in Bill C‑356 introduced by the Conservative Party leader. Could you tell us today, or else in writing, what similar items there are in the two bills?

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to split my speaking time with my colleague, Mr. Morrice, who represents very important values. If you could stop me after two minutes, I would let him have my last two minutes of speaking time.

Minister, on the subject of housing, cracking down on Airbnb is an excellent measure. Using federal lands for building social housing is an excellent measure. These are two very good measures.

A lot of witnesses have reminded us of the importance of having an acquisition fund for getting existing rental units out of the market in order to protect them from financialization and make sure they stay affordable. That is very important.

In the economic statement, I get the impression that you have stolen an idea from the bill introduced by the Conservative leader. One thing you could do is to reduce infrastructure transfers if municipalities do not build enough housing. I am enormously concerned about such a measure. With higher interest rates, for example, we have seen housing starts collapse in Quebec. That is not the municipalities' fault, but it leads to lengthy delays.

I would like to hear more details about this measure that you want to adopt, to threaten municipalities that their funding for housing will be cut if they do not build enough units.

Motions in amendment

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Madam Speaker, “We who live in free market societies believe that growth, prosperity and, ultimately, human fulfilment, are created from the bottom up, not the government down.” That is a quote by the great Ronald Reagan.

After eight years of the Liberal-NDP government, it is abundantly clear that it is not worth the cost. Its economic mismanagement, malpractice and neglect on the economy has led to some of the most miserable outcomes for Canadians today. We have a Prime Minister who says that budgets will balance themselves and who does not think about monetary policy and the misery of Canadians. However, that same monetary policy has a cause and effect relationship to the misery of Canadians. It truly shows that the government has absolutely no idea what it is doing today. As a result of the cause and effect, Canadians today are more reliant on the government. Whether or not that is the intention of the NDP-Liberal government, at the end of the day, it is the pain and misery that Canadians are facing that is making what we used to think of as the Canadian dream fade away.

Whether someone's family has been here for generations or someone is working hard to become a Canadian citizen, more and more, it is clear that the same Canadian dream is gone. We see that the government has spent more than every government before it, combined, did, which has led to 40-year highs in inflation and the most rapid interest rate hikes ever seen in Canadian history, while putting Canadians most at risk in the G7 of a mortgage default crisis. The Canadian dream is gone. Everything is up in this country: rents, mortgages, food prices, the debt and taxes. It is sad that the only thing that is truly down right now is the economy. That goes back to the cause and effect of the Liberal-NDP government, which does not think about monetary policy but is the cause of that monetary policy.

Everything feels like it is broken. Canadians who open their fridges and look at their bank accounts are seeing that the government is not only taking more but also leaving them with less and with worse outcomes than ever before. The misery is real. We travel across this country and hear that pain from everybody. When the government is taking more, it means it is taking more from somebody, from Canadians. Their paycheques are shrinking. Throw a job-killing carbon tax scam on top of that. It is not only making food prices go up; it is also taking more away from Canadians, with higher utility bills and higher costs when they fill up their gas tanks and just take care of everyday basic necessities. After eight years of the Liberal-NDP government, the most basic things have become a luxury: heating one's home, filling up with gas and even buying groceries these days. People are cutting back after eight years of the government.

There is a phenomenon that has begun in the middle class. A middle-class family with two income earners is now going to the food bank because they cannot afford to eat, to heat their home and to house themselves. That is the cause and effect of a Prime Minister who does not think about monetary policy.

Housing has doubled; there is double trouble everywhere. The government has doubled the cost of rent and mortgages because of all of its deficit spending and the debt of more than half a trillion dollars, which led to the interest rate hikes to tackle the inflation that was caused by the government. The other side of the equation is housing supply, which has also been affected by mismanagement and all of the government spending. Not only are people not able to get into homes because of low supply, but because of the high interest rates caused by the spending, homebuyers also cannot get into new homes they would like to buy. As well, builders are affected by not being able to build because of the high interest rates. That is why it is double trouble by the double-trouble Liberal-NDP government.

The cost of everything is up; it has exploded. The issue of housing is not being tackled. We are seeing a lot of photo ops. There is a huge fund that the government has put aside for photo ops, but there is nothing concrete to get things built. In fact, the CMHC warns that Canada will see a decline in the number of new homes being built this year. At a time when the government says we have a housing accelerator, it is too bad that everything it is doing is decelerating homes being built in this country. It is decelerating the economy as well. America's productivity, its GDP per capita and its economy itself, is booming. It grew 5.2%. Canada's contracted, and it will stay that way for a very long time. That means investment will not come in to help get homes built. Investment will not come in to create good jobs and more powerful paycheques for our Canadian people. It means that less and less productivity will be happening, which ultimately means that Canadians are getting poorer as the government is getting richer by taxing them more and more.

Anyone renewing their mortgage today knows the pain. It was just a few years ago that the Prime Minister and the finance minister said that Canadians should go out and borrow as much they want because rates would stay low for a very long time. That could have been true, but what people did not expect was for the Liberal-NDP government to dump billions and billions of dollars of fuel on the inflationary fire that the government started, which made interest rates go up because it increased inflation. All that inflationary spending is the misery that mortgage borrowers are seeing today. Rates are up, and now when they go to renew their mortgages, they are renewing at a minimum of double, and sometimes triple, the rate. There is a huge crisis looming if the government does not get its act together and balance the budget.

The dream of home ownership is dead. Nine out of 10 young people are saying the dream is gone and they will never be able to afford a home. Unless someone's parents are rich, or they owned a home, it is impossible for anyone else to own a home today, all because of the government's economic mismanagement. Rents are up, and more people are relying on renting, not being able to afford homes. The rental market is booming but also suffering. Anyone who is renting today has seen their rent doubled. That is after just eight years of the Prime Minister. It took just eight years for all of this misery to come to fruition.

What are the Liberals doing on housing? They have created billions of dollars of photo op funds that they keep re-announcing and recycling, and that is all they have. What they are not doing is taking any meaningful action on it. They have put billions of dollars toward programs, some that have 13 projects. It seems that there are members on the Liberal benches who have probably flipped more homes than they what they have gotten built under some of these programs.

It is time for a common-sense Conservative government. I encourage everyone watching today, and members on the other side, to watch our common-sense leader's common-sense documentary on the housing hell that Canadians are seeing today, and actual solutions for how to get it fixed. There is a common-sense Conservative bill tabled in the House, under our leader, called the “Building homes not bureaucracy” bill. On top of that, I would encourage everyone to take a look at our common-sense Conservative plan that would bring home more powerful paycheques by lowering costs by axing the tax on gas, groceries and home heating. We are going to bring home more powerful paycheques by balancing the budget so we can bring down inflation. That would bring down interest rates and let people stay in their homes. We are going to bring more homes people can afford. Again, I would encourage everyone to watch the documentary. It deserves awards, and it might even get some. Maybe the Liberals could actually learn something and take something away from it.

We are going to bring home safer streets by making sure we focus on jail and not bail for repeat offenders. Instead of taking guns away from lawful gun owners such as hunters, sport shooters and our indigenous communities, we are going to use that money at the border to stop the flow of drugs, illegal guns and crime that are coming in. Most importantly, we are going to bring home freedom once again. Many people who came to this country, like myself, might have left countries where there was not much in the way of freedom of speech and freedom of expression. When they come here, they are asking why they left the country they came from. Under our common-sense Conservative leader, we are going to bring home freedom and make sure we bring home powerful paycheques.