Human Resources Committee on June 8th, 2026

[Coleen Volk]

Certainly.

Do you mind if I answer in English?

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

I don't mind.

[Coleen Volk]

Thank you very much. It's because I'm a little short on technical vocabulary in French.

The other indicators that we would look at are particular permits. As Mathieu described, there are different kinds of permits earlier in the process, such as excavation permits. These are important indicators for us, because they gauge the mood earlier in the process and we can get an idea of what builders' intentions might be next year or the year after. They're an earlier indicator of what's to come. At this particular point in time, that's a very important distinction.

By the time the foundation is being poured, a project has probably been in the works for several years, given the permitting, event permits, zoning and all the steps that have to be taken before they actually pour the foundation. A lot has happened. Housing starts are a good indicator of what will be completed, but right at this moment, they're not necessarily a good indicator of what's going to be completed three years from now. For that, we would look at today's sentiment, which we would see through such things as permits—the information that Mathieu is now collecting. That data, while not perfectly correlated to ultimate completions, does give us a good indication of what's on people's minds now and whether the sentiment is increasing or decreasing in terms of how much builders would like to build.

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

Thank you, Ms. Volk.

Mr. Laberge, with the creation of new entities like Build Canada Homes, how does the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation plan to coordinate its efforts to improve data collection, planning and the acceleration of residential construction?

[Mathieu Laberge]

In fact, our role is to work very closely with Build Canada Homes to facilitate the exchange of information. For example, we provide information to our colleagues at Build Canada Homes and the department to inform their work. We're also holding discussions to gain access to certain information in order to improve our data on housing starts and market activity.

Obviously, operational data requires a lot of work before we can use it for research purposes. This data isn't always standardized and varies a great deal. Its variability is greater than that of the data collected for research purposes through surveys or administrative data collection. So, in this context, we're consulting with our colleagues at Build Canada Homes to determine what is feasible.

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

Speaking of which, let's take a comprehensive approach to the housing crisis. Debates on housing often focus on just one solution at a time. Could you provide an overview of the various measures currently being implemented to address both the supply and demand sides of the housing market?

[Mathieu Laberge]

To answer your question, I could describe our reading of the current situation in the market.

We've seen some resilience in housing starts since the beginning of 2026. However, we are noticing a gradual slowdown. When we look at building permits, we see that housing starts are expected to continue easing off for the rest of 2026 and into 2027.

If we go even further up the continuum, we also note that, in the condo market, for example, pre-sales are at a historically low level. That tells us that housing starts should continue to slow down beyond 2027, at least for condos. We don't have equivalent data for single-family homes or other types of housing. We are working with the industry on a survey to get an even fuller picture of the market.

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

That's it for me, Mr. Chair. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

You took five minutes and 10 seconds, sir.

Ms. Larouche, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Laberge, Mike Moffat told this committee about a lack of family housing. Does your data show that we're building enough homes with three bedrooms or more to meet the needs of families?

[Mathieu Laberge]

We see a number of things. That's a great question.

I think that to answer you properly, I have to go back in time a bit. What we see is that the largest units, which we call the missing middle, meaning multiplexes with large units, townhouses or, obviously, single-family homes, made up the vast majority of housing starts in Canada up until 2012. Starting in 2012, multi-unit buildings became the focus of the majority of housing starts, and that has grown over time. Initially, until 2025, it was condos. Since 2025, rental units have accounted for the largest share of housing starts.

Now, when we look at the number of large unit starts, we see that, especially in the ownership market, those units generally take the longest to sell. Think, for example, of a tower in the centre of a city. The value of the land is a very large part of the value of the building. The larger the unit, obviously, the more land value it accounts for. As a result, these units are generally more expensive. Therefore, in urban centres, it's mathematically more difficult to offer this kind of unit at a relatively affordable price. However, outside urban centres, it becomes easier to do so for larger units with three rooms or more.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Last week, we celebrated the 30th annual Quebec Week of Persons with Disabilities. How many subsidized housing units meet universal accessibility standards?

[Mathieu Laberge]

In terms of overall housing starts, you would have to look at the program data. I don't have that data for our housing starts. We don't collect it as part of the housing starts and completed units survey.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madame Larouche.

Mr. Genuis, you have five minutes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Before proceeding to my questions, I want to provide the committee with a brief notice of motion. I've been hearing a great deal of concern about the unequal treatment of British pensioners in Canada, and I'd like to give notice of the following motion to be discussed by the committee at a later date.

The motion is as follows:

That the committee report to the House its concern that British state pensioners in Canada are treated differently from state pensioners in many other countries, and call on the Government of Canada and the Government of the UK to work together on fixing the situation to provide equal treatment for British pensioners living in Canada.

Having said that, I'll proceed to my questions.

Thank you very much for being here.

I want to start by asking a question about the CMHC's independence.

I appreciate that you're offering views on various housing policy questions and I appreciate that you have a role of independent operation, but is it fair to say that in this type of forum, you're not going to directly contradict or oppose government policy? If I ask you if you disagree with or agree with government policy, you probably won't answer that so directly if the true answer is that you disagree. Is that fair to surmise?

[Coleen Volk]

I think it's best for us to provide our advice to government in the context of the privilege that the government enjoys with our advice.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You provide advice to the government, and you're not here to articulate disagreement with the government even if the advice you provided might have been different. Is that fair?

[Coleen Volk]

If our advice was provided in confidence, and it usually was, then the answer is yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

That's fair enough. I think that's totally understandable. I just want to understand the context.

Especially following up on my colleague Ms. Falk's questions on the decision to create Build Canada Homes, a separate bureaucracy, you identified what the Prime Minister's views were in that regard. Is it also fair to observe that all of the things that are notionally in Build Canada Homes' mandate were in, and remain in, CMHC's mandate?

[Coleen Volk]

CMHC has a very broad enabling legislative mandate, so yes, there are many things we could do within our mandate. We weren't actively doing them all at the time, but yes, we do have a very broad mandate.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

CMHC wasn't doing all the things it could do. Of course, that's somewhat inevitable, but CMHC had within its existing mandate the things that are also within Build Canada Homes' mandate.

You identified that it was the Prime Minister's view that creating an additional bureaucracy alongside CMHC would somehow lead to greater focus. It is true, based on the legislative mandate, that CMHC could have undertaken those same activities and could have created a focused division for the implementation of those activities. Is that correct?

[Coleen Volk]

Our legislated mandate was very broad. Our active mandate was not as broad as some of the things that Build Canada Homes is doing, but our legislated mandate was broad.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You would have had the capacity, and you continue to have the capacity, to do the things that Build Canada Homes is tasked with doing.

You also highlighted that there's a certain.... When you speak about affordable housing and market housing, of course there can be some fuzziness in terms of this distinction. Everybody is looking to be able to afford a home. There are some people who would clearly struggle without support, and there are some people who are clearly able to support the purchase of a home on their own, but there are many people in the middle who benefit from policies that support housing affordability, even if they're not benefiting from what we would outright classify as affordable housing. Is that correct?

[Coleen Volk]

There are areas in which Build Canada Homes might have a role to play, and we might have a role to play in the same project, if that's what you mean.

I'll clarify that we were legally enabled to do those things, but I wouldn't say they were in our active mandate or that we had the immediate capacity to do them. Some of the things that Build Canada Homes is going to do would have required us to gear up to do them as well.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

That's right, but you had the existing legal mandate to do them. The government could have made policy decisions around using existing resources to do those things, and they chose not to.

You said the Prime Minister's view was that there was a need to create a separate, focused organization. Would it be fair to ask if your view was the same as or different from the Prime Minister's in this regard, or would it be better to avoid asking that question so directly?