Thank you so much. Thank you to the chair.
Before I begin, I'd like to acknowledge that I'm joining the committee today from Toronto, which is the traditional territory of many first nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples.
I'm very pleased to meet with the committee today in my new capacity as president and chief executive officer of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. As many of you may know, I was appointed to this position effective April 6, succeeding our former president and CEO Evan Siddall. Prior to this, I served in a number of other capacities at CMHC, first as chief risk officer when I joined the company in 2015, and more recently as senior vice-president of client solutions.
Like everybody at CMHC, I'm motivated by our aspiration, “By 2030, everyone in Canada has a home that they can afford and that meets their needs.” Housing affordability is compelling for me personally, because I believe it is essential for our nation and for creating a Canada that is truly equitable and a place where every person can fulfill their potential and prosper.
Our aspiration has never been more relevant than it is today. Housing affordability is a top concern for Canadians, heightened in no small part by the COVID-19 pandemic and the new awareness that it's created among us of the sanctuary of a home.
We see that house prices continue to rise in major centres across the country. Young households are taking on more and more debt. This represents a substantial threat to Canada's financial stability in the event that interest rates or unemployment levels begin to increase significantly.
The current environment is also accentuating the economic divide between those who can afford to purchase a home and those who cannot. At CMHC, our work to improve affordability is supported in part by the national housing strategy, a 10-year, $70-billion plan to give more Canadians a place to call home.
National housing strategy programs generally focus on those Canadians who are most vulnerable, such as seniors, people with disabilities, women and children fleeing violence, and people from indigenous and other racialized groups.
They also focus on addressing the biggest challenge to affordability, which is the lack of housing supply. Core NHS programs support projects that build new rental homes and renovate existing ones.
Federal investments in affordable housing have been growing year by year, including in budget 2020, which proposes to invest $2.5 billion in new funding for housing. The budget also proposes to reallocate $1.3 billion in existing funding to help build, repair and support 35,000 existing housing units sooner than planned. All of this new and accelerated funding will be delivered by CMHC.
Of particular note, the government is expanding its investment in the highly successful rapid housing initiative, or RHI. As the committee may know, the RHI was introduced last fall with federal funding of $1 billion to quickly create affordable housing for vulnerable people who have been most affected by the pandemic.
At the same time, the goal was also to stimulate the economy, creating good jobs when they're needed most.
The initiative provided funding to cover the construction of modular housing, including land acquisition. It also supported projects to convert existing buildings to affordable housing. Cities, provinces, non-profit organizations, indigenous organizations and government bodies were eligible to apply for the RHI funding. Most importantly, all housing had to be created within a year of signing the funding agreement.
The results for RHI exceeded all expectations. The original goal of the program was to create 3,000 units of permanent affordable housing. By working with partners and communities across the country, we were able to sign agreements that will create some 4,700 units. We also received many excellent proposals that far exceeded the initial budget.
As a result of the success of this approach and the high level of interest and capacity to do more, the government included an additional $1.5 billion for the RHI in budget 2021. This new investment should create another 4,500 units of housing. I'm also pleased to note that 25% of this new funding has been allocated to projects for women, who sadly have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Further details about the RHI will be announced shortly.
With the RHI, other budget measures and ongoing programs, it's going to be a very busy year for CMHC. Nevertheless, I have every confidence in the ability of our 2,200 employees across the country to deliver on the government's expectations with respect to the national housing strategy.
CMHC will also continue to deliver its commercial programs. This will enable us to support our mandate to support financial stability. Through our mortgage funding programs, we make low-cost funding available to financial institutions to support their lending activities. Our mortgage insurance products, on the other hand, have enabled qualified homebuyers and developers to access financing at very competitive interest rates.
Last year, our mortgage insurance products helped more than 94,000 households purchase homes across Canada, and supported the construction of more than 174,000 new homes in multi-unit projects. We will continue to monitor the state of the housing markets across the country to identify signs of potential vulnerabilities. We are also partnering with other stakeholders on research and data collection and analysis to explore innovative solutions to the complex challenges facing Canada's housing system.
CMHC has also begun to implement a company-wide strategy to become a climate change leader. We are accelerating our efforts to meet our anti-racism and equity commitments. This is not only integral to our 2030 aspiration, but is of great importance to me personally, as a person of Asian heritage.
As for my new role, I'm taking time to meet with our board of directors, management team, employees, affordable housing providers, private developers, the non-profit sector, industry associations, bank CEOs, government partners and indigenous organizations, to list just a few. I have been seeking their insights on their vision for CMHC and the role we should play in the housing system going forward. I'm calling this my “listening tour”. It's been a very productive time so far, and I've listened to many ideas people have regarding the future of CMHC.
My own thinking is that there will never be sufficient funding at the federal level to reach our aspiration for housing affordability for everybody in Canada, whether they choose to rent or own. While the national housing strategy provides a very significant investment, a bigger and broader effort is needed. Housing is very complex and is not solely a federal responsibility. In fact, most housing in Canada is provided by the private sector. Having said that, there is a huge opportunity for CMHC to foster greater collaboration between partners to address affordability challenges. CMHC can use its influence and expertise to identify, highlight and address the barriers to housing affordability.
On my listening tour, many people have emphasized that the value CMHC brings to housing is a combination of its policy and market expertise, its ability to deliver national housing programs, and its knowledge of the housing markets through its mortgage insurance, mortgage funding and market analysis programs. I believe these strengths and our unique mix of publicly funded and commercial programs position us to harness the power of the private and non-profit sectors to achieve the results we seek—results that we believe will ultimately benefit all Canadians.
Chair, I would like to thank you again for the opportunity to meet with the committee today. I'd be very happy to take any questions at this time.
