Thank you, Mr. Chair and honourable members.
It's a pleasure to be here to follow up on the brief we submitted in September.
Our association in New Brunswick has 213 non-profit and co-op housing providers who are serving some 6,000 households in New Brunswick. Our members provide affordable housing to people with low incomes, whether they be families, seniors, or clients with special needs.
The needs are great. In New Brunswick there are 30,000 households in need of affordable housing. That compares with the total number in Canada of 1.7 million. So these numbers are huge, and there's obviously a lot of work to do there.
Many of our clientele deal with poverty issues. They have problems providing for the basic necessities of life, such as food, shelter, and clothing. We try to help address these issues by providing safe and affordable housing. But to be successful in this work, we need to have the support of all levels of government and the cooperation of the private sector, working in partnership in developing affordable housing strategies.
In our brief we state that we feel that the federal government must be the leader here in the development of a long-term affordable housing strategy that will serve all Canadians. This strategy would recognize that affordable housing is a major pillar in building a strong and competitive Canada. So we call on the present government to make a commitment for itself and for future governments to maintain an annual level of investment in housing at current levels and to work in partnership with the other levels of government, the private sector, and the non-profit community to effect these housing goals.
Last year, the federal government transferred some funding to the provinces and territories via housing trusts, and this money was to be spent by March 31, 2009. However, since the allocation of those funds, we haven't heard anything more from government regarding any longer-term plans. As well, we want to make it clear, as we did in our brief, that we're very concerned that federal investment in housing is in fact declining. I've passed out copies of a report from the Canadian Housing and Renewal Association where the analysis shows that federal expenditures in housing will be declining steadily from now until 2040, and over that time period, there will be $32 billion in federal dollars that we want to stay in place to ensure the viability of the affordable stock that has been built up over the last 40 or 50 years and to provide for new additions to the stock. This is not new money; this would just be keeping the current level of federal investment in housing in place, rather than letting it decline.
In terms of Canada's tax system, we feel that individuals and corporations should pay their fair share, but we agree with the Wellesley Institute in Toronto, which maintains that the system right now puts too much of an emphasis on individuals. So we would like the government to address the inequity there.
In terms of tax cuts, everybody is talking about tax cuts. We have an example of the cut to the GST. We would favour a more targeted use of tax resources to help those who are in need. The tax loss of the GST cut amounts to some $4.5 billion dollars, which equates to the rough estimate of the annual cost of homelessness to Canadian taxpayers. So we think appropriating that amount of money to homelessness makes more sense than giving an across-the-board cut to the GST.
In our work, we're trying to provide people with affordable housing and help them to become more productive and better able to pay income taxes than to be a draw on tax revenue. Homelessness and the lack of affordable housing results in costs to Canadian taxpayers. A recent Dalhousie University study showed that providing the support of housing is by far the cheapest way to address homelessness. It costs $40 a day to provide someone a supportive housing environment, while in comparison a hospital can run to anywhere from $200 to $650 per day, a shelter can be $50 to $60 a day, and a jail can be $120 a day. Housing is very low-cost and cost-effective for government.