Gregor Robertson Liberal
This bill has received Royal Assent and is, or will soon become, law.
This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.
This enactment establishes Build Canada Homes as a Crown corporation. The purpose of Build Canada Homes is to promote, support and develop the supply of affordable housing in Canada and to promote innovative and efficient building techniques in the housing construction sector in Canada. The enactment, among other things,
(a) sets out the powers of Build Canada Homes and its governance framework;
(b) authorizes the Minister of Finance to make payments out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund to fund the operations and activities of Build Canada Homes; and
(c) provides that the Governor in Council may transfer to Build Canada Homes the property, rights, interests and obligations held by any Crown corporation or subsidiary of a Crown corporation and may issue directives for measures to be taken in relation to the reorganization of Canada Lands Company Limited or any of its subsidiaries.
It also includes transitional provisions, makes a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act and contains coordinating amendments.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Bill numbers are reused for different bills each new session. Perhaps you were looking for one of these other C-20s:
This is a computer-generated summary of the speeches below. Usually it’s accurate, but every now and then it’ll contain inaccuracies or total fabrications.
This bill establishes "Build Canada Homes" as a new federal Crown corporation tasked with consolidating housing initiatives, leveraging federal lands, and partnering with stakeholders to accelerate affordable housing construction. Debate focuses on whether the measure will improve administrative effectiveness or merely create unnecessary government bureaucracy.
Liberal
Conservative
NDP
Bloc
Green
Bienvenu-Olivier Ntumba Liberal Mont-Saint-Bruno—L’Acadie, QC
Madam Speaker, the Red Seal program is a very important program. Canada is facing an extremely serious labour crisis and a housing crisis. If we want more housing, we need more people to build it. By investing in these programs, our government is taking proactive steps to quickly address an existing crisis.
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands—Rideau Lakes, ON
Madam Speaker, when it comes to the Liberal government's response to the housing crisis in our country, I believe that Canadians are looking to see steps that the government can take to immediately address this acute housing challenge without creating additional bureaucracies.
Within the current remit of existing agencies, what additional powers do they hope to glean, at great additional expense to the taxpayer, that will more quickly resolve the very acute housing challenge that Canadians are facing?
Bienvenu-Olivier Ntumba Liberal Mont-Saint-Bruno—L’Acadie, QC
Madam Speaker, the only power we have is the power that comes to us from the people of Canada, who elected us to carry out these important mandates in light of the current housing crisis. We are therefore taking action on behalf of Canadians. We are taking action because the housing market is in a deep crisis. That is why we are creating Build Canada Homes: to immediately respond to the current crisis.
Claude DeBellefeuille Bloc Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC
Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague on his speech. I know he recently celebrated his first year as an MP, and I imagine he has not yet had the opportunity to work closely on specific projects with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or CMHC.
I have been an MP for several years now, and I can say that CMHC was a fairly important body for vetting business plans, as well as for ensuring that social housing meets various standards, particularly energy efficiency standards, and that our new housing meets the highest construction standards in terms of both sustainability and development.
I would like my colleague to clarify this for me, because I do not really understand. Essentially, Build Canada Homes is taking the place of CMHC. Will the CMHC's expertise be transferred to Build Canada Homes?
Bienvenu-Olivier Ntumba Liberal Mont-Saint-Bruno—L’Acadie, QC
Madam Speaker, the advantage I have is that I served at the local government level before being elected to the federal Parliament. I saw how local authorities went to great lengths to push funding projects through, because dealing with CMHC involved a lot of red tape. Build Canada Homes brings everything together in one place. People submit an application and all the answers are in one place. It is flexible, efficient and it meets our needs.
Connie Cody Conservative Cambridge, ON
Madam Speaker, I would like to ask for unanimous consent to split my time with the member for Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge.
Build Canada Homes ActGovernment Orders
The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès) Alexandra Mendes
Does the hon. member have unanimous consent to split her time?
Connie Cody Conservative Cambridge, ON
Madam Speaker, I rise to speak on Bill C‑20 with deep concern for the families in my community who are watching this housing crisis unfold before their eyes.
In Cambridge, I have witnessed what the government struggles to acknowledge. What we are navigating is no longer a housing crisis; it is a housing catastrophe. Rebranding existing projects does not build homes.
Let me tell the House about an 84-year-old constituent of mine. She worked her entire life, paid her taxes faithfully and raised her family with dignity, yet a staggering cost of living, property taxes and maintenance costs consumed her pension and home ownership, pushing her to seek refuge in a Cambridge shelter overwhelmed by those without a roof. There are so many people that shelters have long wait-lists, and they can no longer accommodate seniors in need.
Members can picture their own grandmother or grandfather struggling up shelter stairs that were never designed for their needs, squeezed into overcrowded dormitories with makeshift bunks, unable to find comfort or rest in spaces designed for temporary crisis, not for the housing needs of seniors who built this country. The dignity of a lifetime of contribution to our community was stripped away by a housing market that no longer recognizes their value or their need.
In today's Canada, people who did everything right are ending up with nowhere to live. This is not the Canada I know. This is not the Canada any of us promised to protect, yet we are witnessing families across this nation face impossible choices because the government has failed to deliver the most basic foundation of security: a home. When housing costs consume 60%, 70%, even 80% of a household's income, families are forced to choose between rent and groceries, between keeping the lights on and keeping a roof overhead. In Cambridge, I have seen families with two working parents, both with steady jobs, unable to afford a modest two-bedroom rental. Teachers, nurses and trades workers are being priced out of the very neighbourhoods they serve. These are not choices any Canadian should face in a country as wealthy and resource-rich as ours.
The mathematics of survival have become impossible for working families. A nurse earning $70,000 annually faces rent costs of $2,500 per month for a basic apartment before utilities, groceries and child care, let alone having any capacity to save for a down payment or dream of owning a home of their own. This represents more than half their gross income for housing alone. When the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation recommends spending no more than 30% of income on shelter, we see how this market has completely failed Canadian families. After 10 years of empty Liberal promises, national strategies and new bureaucracies, what do we have to show for it? We have another Crown corporation, another layer of administration, another committee that multiplies meetings while families feel the grip of inflating rent.
Bill C-20 asks us to celebrate yet another bureaucracy, the fourth housing agency under the Liberal government, while seniors face impossible housing costs and families are priced out of entire communities. The Liberals created the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation's national housing strategy with great fanfare. They established the federal lands initiative. They launched the rapid housing initiative. Each came with press conferences, ribbon-cuttings and promises that this time would be different. It is not.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer has made it clear that this new Crown corporation will contribute just 5,000 homes per year, which is 1% of what the Liberals promised. The Liberal housing minister himself admitted there are no targets set for the number of homes to build. How can we take seriously a housing plan with no housing targets? What kind of strategy refuses to define its own objectives while families wait in desperation? These numbers represent a scathing indictment of Liberal priorities. Across a nation of nearly 40 million people, 5,000 homes annually means one new home for every 8,000 Canadians. In Cambridge alone, with a population of just over 160,000, this would translate to fewer than 18 new homes per year for this grand federal initiative.
This is not merely policy failure. This is a matter of life, death and dignity for Canadians. Behind these statistics are real people facing real crises that demand our immediate attention. The housing market has become a barrier to the very foundation of Canadian life. Economic mobility, once the hallmark of our nation, is grinding to a halt as housing costs consume an ever larger share of family budgets.
Let me address a particularly troubling consequence of this crisis. Women trapped in abusive relationships face an impossible choice when financial abuse underlies domestic violence. Those who want to leave dangerous situations must choose between staying with abusers who control their finances or face homelessness because safe, affordable housing simply does not exist. The cruel irony is that when women finally find the courage to leave dangerous relationships, they discover that housing costs make independence impossible.
Meanwhile, children aging out of foster care find themselves with nowhere to turn. At 18, they are expected to navigate an adult world without the family support most young people rely on, yet they face housing costs that challenge families with dual incomes. These young people, who should be focusing on education, building careers and contributing to our communities, instead spend their energy simply trying to survive in a market that treats housing as a commodity rather than a necessity. Builders in my community consistently raise concerns about rising costs, lengthy approval processes and regulatory requirements that change throughout projects.
Those challenges make it difficult to plan, invest and expand. Some builders also struggle to retain skilled workers. Construction depends on a stable workforce. Industry uncertainty makes it harder to provide the long-term opportunities that workers and families rely on. When housing opportunities arise, we lack the workforce to build at scale because skilled trades have moved to more stable sectors. The skilled trade shortage has reached crisis proportions. Electricians, plumbers and carpenters are aging out faster than young people are entering these fields. Why would a young person commit to an apprenticeship when project delays make steady employment impossible?
Development charges have increased by 180% over the past decade in some Ontario municipalities, while approval timelines have stretched from months to years. These costs are passed directly to homebuyers.
Across the country, many young adults are delaying major life decisions like marriage and starting families because of housing costs. They cannot afford to care for themselves, let alone children. We are witnessing the fundamental promise of Canadian life, that hard work leads to prosperity and security, crumble under the weight of housing costs that have far outpaced wage growth. Even Statistics Canada reports that birth rates have declined to historic lows, with housing costs cited as a primary factor in family planning decisions.
At some point, we all have to ask whether the answer is another layer of federal administration or whether the focus should be on removing the barriers that prevent homes from being built in the first place. Canadians are not asking for more organizational charts. They are asking for more homes. That is why Conservatives believe the focus should be on removing barriers to construction rather than creating new bureaucracies.
We would cut the GST on all new homes under $1.3 million, immediately saving families up to $65,000, making home ownership achievable for thousands more Canadians. We would tie federal infrastructure dollars directly to homebuilding results, requiring municipalities to permit at least 15% more housing each year or forfeit federal funding. We would seek to end the capital gains tax on reinvestments in new housing construction, unlocking billions of private investment that is currently sitting on the sidelines. These measures would reduce construction costs by tens of thousands of dollars.
While the government creates new departments and new delays, we would create new opportunities and new homes. Our approach recognizes that housing is built by workers with tools, not by bureaucrats with organizational charts. Canadians have waited long enough for leadership that understands the urgency of this crisis and the necessity of bold action to solve it. These are practical measures focused on increasing supply and improving affordability. They recognize that every family needs a home.
How can we ask Canadians to call Canada home when we cannot trust the government to provide the foundation they need to build their lives?
Bill C-20 offers bureaucracy where Canadians need action, it offers committees where families need shelter and it offers promises where communities need results. For that reason, I cannot support Bill C-20, because rebranding existing projects does not build homes.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, it is disappointing that the Conservatives maintain the principle of just getting out of the way, when, in fact, this is something that is necessary. It is one of the ways we can actually work in a collaborative fashion with provincial, territorial and indigenous communities and the different stakeholders to improve and build Canada's housing stock, particularly in the area of affordable housing.
The leader of the Conservative Party, when he was the minister of housing, built a grand total of, and if I had a drum, I would roll it, six homes. There is absolutely no surprise here that the Conservatives have decided not to support the legislation, but there is a disappointment.
Does the member opposite believe that the federal government has a role to play in building Canada homes?
Connie Cody Conservative Cambridge, ON
Madam Speaker, Canadians are not living in the past. They are living through a housing crisis that has worsened dramatically over the past 10 years. Under the government, Canada has experienced rising costs, declining affordability and the most severe housing pressures we have seen in a generation.
What once was a challenge has now become a full-blown housing catastrophe. The consequences are very real. Women are staying in dangerous situations because they have nowhere to go. Shelters are full. Providers in communities like mine are turning people away because there are simply no beds available. Those frontline organizations are not asking for more announcements or more studies or more excuses. They are asking for action. The reality is this. The government promised homes but delivered bureaucracy. Rebranding programs and making announcements does not build homes, and Canadians are paying the price.
Mario Simard Bloc Jonquière, QC
Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois supports the bill, but I agree with my colleague that it adds another layer of complexity.
My riding is home to some social housing projects that were supposed to be funded by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Now we are waiting for the funding, because the program has been deprioritized or sidelined by Build Canada Homes. As of today, we are still waiting for a response from Build Canada Homes regarding funding that was due years ago. There has already been a delay, and now a new structure is being added. The government appears to have rushed this process. I am wondering whether my colleague has any similar examples in her riding.
Connie Cody Conservative Cambridge, ON
Madam Speaker, to restore housing affordability in Canada, we will have to double housing construction across the country, adding more than 200,000 units each year for the next decade. Build Canada Homes will hardly scratch the surface, building only a few thousand units a year at best. Since the inception of Build Canada Homes last September, demand for shelter space has risen dramatically, and the perceived accomplishments from Build Canada Homes have not offset any of the high rates of families seeking—
Build Canada Homes ActGovernment Orders
The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Alexandra Mendès) Alexandra Mendes
Questions and comments, the hon. member for Saanich—Gulf Islands.
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Madam Speaker, there was so much I agreed with in the speech the member gave. She referred to the fact that we should look at homes as homes and not as investments. If I am not quoting her accurately, I am sure she can correct me.
The concept that Greens also bring to this is that we are building homes and communities. We are not just building homes for market purposes. We need to meet the needs of communities and help people actually have a life with dignity.
I wonder if the member has any comments on the approach between a Crown corporation, bricks and mortar, and what we can do to make people's lives better.