Human Resources Committee on Dec. 4th, 2025

[The Chair (Robert Morrissey (Egmont, Lib.)), Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Good afternoon, everyone.

I now declare the meeting open.

Welcome to meeting number 19 of the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities. The committee is meeting today on government mandates and key priorities for the first hour, and on the impacts of the temporary foreign worker program on the labour market for the second hour.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person and remotely using Zoom. For this hour, all participants will be in person in the room. The clerk has advised me that we do have quorum and that nobody is appearing virtually.

Before we begin, you have the option of choosing to participate in the official language of your choice. Please make sure you're on the right channel, if you're in the room, for the language you wish to participate in. I would also remind everyone who is appearing to silence their devices so that we do not interrupt the proceedings. Please refrain from tapping on the microphone boom for the protection of the translators. As well, please direct all questions through me as chair, and wait until I recognize you by name before you participate.

Appearing today is the Honourable Gregor Robertson, Minister of Housing and Infrastructure.

We also have Andre Charbonneau, deputy chief financial officer, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.

From the Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities, we have Paul Halucha, deputy minister; and Luc Robitaille, deputy chief financial officer.

From the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority, we have Joël Hupé, chief financial and administrative officer.

Minister Robertson, you have five minutes for your opening statement, please.

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Minister of Housing and Infrastructure]

Mr. Chair, committee members, hello.

Thank you for inviting me to appear before you.

I'm pleased to be able to talk about my mandate, my priorities and the supplementary estimates.

I'm accompanied today by Paul Halucha, deputy minister of housing, infrastructure and communities Canada and others.

As the Minister of Housing and Infrastructure, my goals are clear: to make housing more affordable through public and private partnerships; to modernize the residential construction industry and make it more productive; to create new careers in skilled trades; and to invest in essential infrastructure.

The funding that we receive is to focus on what matters: housing and homelessness; public transit; major infrastructure projects; disaster mitigation; and green, rural and northern infrastructure across the country. Our government knows that every home depends on the infrastructure that keeps communities functional, such as water, sewer, storm water or management systems. That's why, alongside building more homes, we are committed to investing in housing-enabling infrastructure that supports the growth of both existing and new neighbourhoods.

I'll take a few minutes to explain how our investments, our policies and programs work together to achieve positive housing outcomes for Canadians.

Since 2017, the national housing strategy has created over 183,000 new homes and protected over 359,000 community housing units. Additionally, since its launch in 2019, Reaching Home, which is Canada's homelessness strategy, has connected over 200,000 people with homelessness prevention supports, such as emergency short-term rental assistance and mediation, and it has helped over 110,000 people attain stable housing.

Building on this important work, on September 14, the Prime Minister and I launched Build Canada Homes. Build Canada Homes is mandated to scale up the supply of affordable housing across Canada, backed by an initial capitalization of $13 billion. This is just the beginning of that investment, through Build Canada Homes, to drive a more productive and innovative homebuilding sector by leveraging public lands, federally controlled land in particular; deploying flexible financial tools to finance more homebuilding; and acting as a catalyst for modern methods of construction.

As the construction ramps up, we will grow, train and support Canada's skilled workforce, and create good-paying jobs along the way. As Build Canada Homes focuses on investments in affordable housing, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, CMHC, will continue to contribute to the well-being of Canada's housing system through existing programs, such as the apartment construction loan program and mortgage loan insurance products, MLI Select being the best known.

In addition to this important work in the housing and homelessness space, I'm committed to supporting the key public infrastructure that Canadians need and use every day. Budget 2025 proposed the build communities strong fund, which will provide over $51 billion over 10 years, starting in 2026-27, and $3 billion a year, ongoing, in new and existing funding. The build communities strong fund will include new initiatives, such as the health infrastructure fund, to support communities where they need it the most.

The existing Canada community-building fund, or CCBF, will be rebranded as the dedicated community stream within the build communities strong fund. It will continue to support a broad range of infrastructure needs for Canada's communities. The build communities strong fund will also support housing-enabling infrastructure alongside programs such as the Canada housing infrastructure fund, CHIF, which has been in place for a number of years, as well as the Canada public transit fund, CPTF. Those investments in public transit, including active transportation—there's climate adaptation funding as well—will continue to be among my key priorities.

In addition, we're making important investments to increase community resilience to natural disasters and extreme weather events. This same commitment to resilience guides my approach across all of housing and infrastructure. I'm prioritizing federal investments to build complete, connected and resilient communities, where everyone has access to a home they can afford.

I look forward to answering your questions.

Thank you everyone.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Minister.

We will begin by first welcoming back Mr. Aitchison to the committee.

Mr. Aitchison, you have six minutes.

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for coming.

I want to get right into it.

You indicated that removing the GST from all new homes under $1.3 million was too sweeping a measure, yet the CMHC reports that we need to be building about 480,000 homes a year. Your government, in fact, during the campaign, promised to do 500,000 homes a year, and yet starts have stalled, basically.

Given the scale of the housing crisis, could you tell this committee what concrete benchmarks your government is using to decide if the incremental steps you've announced are going to work, if they are working and if you need to take bigger steps?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

The initial commitment to implement a first-time homebuyers' GST break is still not through the House, as members will know. We want to see that implemented as soon as possible, because it will create opportunity for first-time homebuyers, with up to $50,000 for first-time homebuyers to access housing and save $50,000 on a home—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Minister, I'm going to interrupt you for a second. I don't need you to describe the programs to me. I'm reasonably familiar with them.

What I want to know is this: What benchmarks are you using to determine whether you need to do more than just the first-time homebuyers' rebate?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

The focus initially is to provide that support to first-time homebuyers, to young Canadians who can't access the market currently. That should be our first priority right now: to make sure we get an affordability measure to young Canadians during these times.

That's a significant investment, with about $4 billion worth of tax revenue that is going—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

What kinds of numbers do you need to see for you to know that it's working?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

Of the numbers that we look at, CMHC is our top source of research and data. They have a significant team that provides that information for the industry and obviously for governments. CMHC data reflects the realities across the country, as well as market data that we see.

Obviously it's important to track all of it. The housing starts are different in different markets across the country. Obviously the GTA and Vancouver are very low in terms of housing starts right now, but other markets are doing very well, certainly in Quebec and Alberta—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Thanks, Minister. It's clear that you don't actually have a number or any benchmark that you're going to share with us now.

Let's go back to that interview. In that same interview, you said, and I quote, “We can't roll the dice with some of these bigger moves. We'll try some incremental steps and see if they make a big difference. If they don't, then maybe we do have to make bigger moves.”

Builders are telling us that pre-sales are collapsing right now, particularly in the GTA and the Lower Mainland. Projects are being shelved. Employees are being laid off. How does the government justify waiting for results when these delayed decisions mean thousands of job losses and fewer homes getting built?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

I think the most troubling aspect is the delay that the member's party has put on this first-time homebuyers' tax break. It has been before the House of Commons since June. It still is not through, due to the procedural delays that the opposition has put forward. Those delays have held back an opportunity to provide up to $50,000 per first-time homebuyer to get the housing market going.

As I said, it's different in different markets. Providing a broad GST break in markets that are doing very well—for example, in Montreal or in some of the markets on the Prairies—would not make sense. We're talking about markets that are struggling. First-time homebuyers—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Minister, I want to stop you for one second. You're trying to put the blame here on Conservatives, but the fact of the matter is that the situation is dire.

You would agree that we're in a housing crisis.

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

I agree that we're in a housing crisis. That's why we shouldn't be delaying the first-time homebuyers' tax—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

Then if it is in fact a crisis, what on earth makes you think that incremental steps and waiting to see what happens is a good approach?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

When I speak of “incremental”, $13 billion for Build Canada Homes is a massive, unprecedented investment in strictly non-market affordable housing, along with $1 billion into transitional supportive housing, because homelessness is a crisis. With those direct interventions, we are focused on significant investment where we have a crisis.

As I outlined with the national housing strategy and with Reaching Home, these are the largest investments Canada has ever made in homelessness and affordable housing, and we're taking it to the next level. We need the rest of the House to support advancing the tax breaks—

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

If we need 500,000 units a year for the next several years, which your government promised to do, which the Prime Minister promised during the campaign, we're talking about trillions of investment in housing.

The $13 billion might seem big to you, but we know full well that one of the biggest impediments to getting homes started and getting homes built is the cost of local government and the delays at the local level, particularly in the Lower Mainland and the GTA, which is where the epicentre of the housing crisis is. It's where the situation is, in fact, the worst.

Mike Moffatt, an economist who has advised your government on a number of occasions on housing, has warned that without decisive action, Canada risks a prolonged construction slowdown and an even deeper supply gap. If the government is so reluctant to make a big move—and I will challenge you that $13 billion is not a big move—what's your plan to get the private sector moving again and building in some of these centres where housing is too expensive?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

Well, the private sector is delivering a lot of housing in most of the Canadian markets. It's Vancouver and Toronto that are challenged and that's where the first-time homebuyer's tax credit can make a real impact. That's where the apartment construction loan program is delivering record levels of rental housing, working with the private sector very directly through CMHC. We're seeing housing starts about 4.6% up year-to-date versus last year.

The industry is building right now. We have to be looking forward several years and that means investing significantly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you.

Mr. Joseph, you have six minutes.

[Natilien Joseph, Liberal, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for joining us. I'd like to congratulate you on your work.

I won't give a long introduction.

As you know, I’m the member for Longueuil—Saint-Hubert. In my riding, we’re experiencing an unprecedented homelessness crisis that has lasted for almost six years. I wasn’t an MP at the beginning of this crisis. I’ve only been a member for six months. You've been in your position for six or seven months as well. Everyone can see our government's commitment.

Budget 2025 announced that $1 billion would be invested in transitional and supportive housing construction. When we speak of support, we're referring to services. Before that, we had the reaching home program.

Organizations and communities working with this clientele are asking me a question that concerns them a lot: Does this $1 billion investment represent a continuation of the reaching home program or its replacement?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

I thank the member for his question.

Reaching Home, has reached almost 10,000 projects across the country since 2019 to date and, as I mentioned before, about 200,000 people who have been assisted with services and 110,000 who have found stable housing through Reaching Home. We are looking at the future with that program, in addition to the $1 billion that is part of Build Canada Homes. Build Canada Homes is focusing on transitional supportive housing using modular technology. We want to see these built as soon as possible with modern methods of construction. We have great models and examples of this, such as in Toronto with Dunn House in the Parkdale neighbourhood, which has those wraparound health services the member described.

We need the provinces to provide the funding for the wraparound services. Those are critical for supportive housing. We're looking at finding provinces to match our capital, as well as getting these built as quickly as possible with factory-built solutions. There are many examples across the country that we can pursue as well.

Many of the communities that you serve in and represent here, including Longueuil, have agreements under Reaching Home. Funding is being provided to address the challenges we have with homelessness. We need to continue to invest through programs like Reaching Home and related programs, such as the veteran homelessness program, which provides about $73 million in funding support. We need to continue these programs and take the best of our learnings from them, as well as add this Build Canada Homes component of an additional billion dollars for supportive housing.

[Natilien Joseph, Liberal, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

That’s good news. If I understand correctly then, the reaching home program will extend beyond 2028. Is that right?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

That is my hope. Obviously, it's at the will of the members of the House of Commons, but certainly I see, if anything, this government scaling up our work to solve homelessness. The challenge continues to be very difficult to solve. We need to do that at all levels of government.

In my past, we tried to do everything we could at the city level, at the local level, which was very difficult without federal and provincial support. We need all levels of government to be investing to solve homelessness. Ultimately, the solutions are the appropriate housing, the supportive housing that ensures that the social and health services are there so that people can get into stable housing and turn their lives around. It's very difficult to do that from shelters and the street.

[Natilien Joseph, Liberal, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Thank you, Minister.

I'm going to ask you some other questions.

Are these billions of dollars new funds or are they supplementary amounts for existing programs?

[Gregor Robertson, Liberal, Vancouver Fraserview—South Burnaby, BC]

If the budget implementation act is passed, that is new funding that will be focused on investing in supportive housing for people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness right now. That's in addition to Reaching Home, the veteran homelessness program, and the unsheltered homelessness and encampments initiative. There's continuing funding in those programs, and the $1 billion is an additional investment in supportive, transitional housing.

[Natilien Joseph, Liberal, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Okay.

How will this amount be distributed over the next few years?