I want to start off by saying that the CMHC recognizes that there is a homelessness crisis in Canada and that there's more the federal government and all orders of government have to do to support housing for those most in need.
CMHC was very pleased to be involved in the development and now the implementation of the national housing strategy, which is a $72-billion plan to address the housing needs of Canadians with a focus on those with the greatest levels of housing precarity.
There's no question that CMHC can do more and needs to do more. I just want to say that I'm very committed to doing what I can to address the issues that the member may be hearing on the ground in Edmonton. We have staff in Edmonton. I'm very happy to address any specific concerns they have.
With respect to the spending of the national housing strategy, I want to point out that we have very specific commitment numbers that we try to hit on a yearly basis. When the national housing strategy was first implemented, it did take some time for CMHC to develop a pipeline and there were delays in getting the money out to proponents, but I'm very pleased to report that, subsequent to that, we have made very significant improvements. As of right now, we are on target in terms of making the commitments to the funding that's been allocated to us.
When there are allocations from one fiscal year to the other, it's not because we have not made the commitments but because of the nature of housing as infrastructure. We provide the funding to proponents as the construction is completed. Oftentimes, it's very difficult to predict how that construction life cycle proceeds. That really is what's driving the transfer of funding from one year to the next.
One of the things we are observing recently is that there has been an impact on the pace of housing development because of certain supply chain disruptions caused by the pandemic, but there's also great pressure in the construction industry, given the huge demands that are on construction workers due to the ambition of infrastructure programs and the need to create a greater housing supply in Canada.