Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
You have our brief. It has the distinction, I think, of being a brief that does not propose any increase in program spending. I think it's a proposal for the times.
We are proposing three things. I'm going to outline two of them and then dwell a bit longer on the third one.
The first is what we see as a need for an accountability framework for federal housing dollars that are passed to the provinces and territories.
Over the last three to four years, the federal government has put significant dollars on the table. Most of that money has been the subject of federal-provincial agreements, and the provinces are pretty much on their own in deciding how they want to spend it. The result of this is that you don't get any tie-in between the federal housing spending and reduction in actual housing need.
There's a very significant core housing need problem in this country, with 1.5 million households considered to be in core need by Statistics Canada and CMHC. We think federal spending should be tied to reducing those numbers. There's a good opportunity coming up, because the federal government is going to redesign the affordable housing initiative. The accountability framework should be part of it, in our view.
The second has to do with the fact that a lot of what we call the legacy programs are coming to an end. The federal government's sponsorship of affordable housing will come to an end, in significant numbers, in the next decade. By 2020, some 55,000 units of housing presently assisted under a variety of federal programs will no longer see any assistance. That's going to be a problem, because the capacity of the housing providers—it applies to housing co-ops, but to all kinds of other providers as well—to continue to house people on fixed incomes, seniors, people with disabilities, and so on is going to be significantly compromised, if there's not a renewal of federal funds to assist people in meeting the housing needs of low-income Canadians.
What we're proposing is again not increased program spending, but that, as program commitments come to an end, the money be left on the table and negotiated into new frameworks with housing providers.
The third one I want to talk about has to do with lending. I want to turn quickly to the social housing renovation and retrofit initiative that was part of the 2009 budget, part of Canada's action plan.
It has been hugely successful. The federal unilateral component, which comprised $75 million in each of two years, has been vastly oversubscribed. The response has been overwhelming. Some 2,200 applications altogether were received by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. They were only able to fund 500 of those in the first tranche. The demand out there is for considerably more money. What this shows is that social housing providers—cooperatives and others—are ready to reinvest in their aging properties. They take their responsibilities as property owners seriously.
There are ways that they can reinvest without actually dipping further into the federal treasury, through loans. The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation has an excellent loan program called direct lending. It was expanded in the 2009 budget so that municipalities could repair housing infrastructure using the loan program. The interest rates are historically low. CMHC has renewed some of those loans under the program. It's a less-than-1% interest rate this year. It's quite amazing. I know it's a sign of the times, but they are able to offer very competitive rates.
What we're saying is why don't we expand that program, especially with interest rates as low as they are, so that existing providers can bundle up their existing debt—they still have outstanding mortgage debt—and refinance it together with new borrowing, so that they can reinvest in their properties? The stimulus effect will be remarkable, and as I said, it doesn't require any program spending, because it would be a loan program on commercial terms: borrowers would have to qualify on commercial terms, and they would have to buy CMHC mortgage insurance. There is no risk of wholesale default or anything like that, if the mortgages are insured.
We've already been talking about this to the minister responsible for CMHC. To me it seems to be a no-brainer. It's a loan program, not a grant program; there is a slew of providers who are ready to line up and refinance and borrow. As I said, the stimulus effect will be amazing. It's a real win-win situation, and I hope you will support it.
Thank you.