Evidence of meeting #6 for Public Accounts in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cmhc.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent—Akiawenhrahk, QC
Do you know the housing accelerator fund's overall record?
Overall, where are we in comparison to the announcements made over a year and a half ago?
How many doors are there? How many housing units have been built?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Give me one second.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Williamson
Your time has expired.
We'll let the witness finish up.
If you feel you need more information in writing, we can ask.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent—Akiawenhrahk, QC
Since Ms. Volk has committed to providing them for Nova Scotia, I'd appreciate it.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
What I have is that, to date, the federal government has signed 178 HAF agreements which, when combined, will fast-track an estimated total of more than 750,000 housing units across the country over the next decade.
I will get you those others as we have them.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Williamson
You'll send them to us. Excellent.
Ms. Yip, you have the floor for five minutes, please.
Liberal
Jean Yip Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Thank you, Chair.
One of the issues raised by Ms. Hogan in her report was the definition of “affordability” for units built under the federal lands initiative. With Build Canada Homes, the definition has changed to show that housing is affordable if it is 30% of a household's income.
Mr. Halucha, could you comment on this definition? Also, how will this guide affordability for housing going forward?
Deputy Minister, Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities
Thank you very much for the question.
Build Canada Homes will define the affordability benchmark to track incomes of households for which housing will be affordable. I'll give you the three elements of this.
Deeply affordable units will be less than 30% of before-tax median household income for households with low or very low income in their regions, so fixed-income or minimum-wage earners are the groups that we expect will benefit. Second, affordable units will be less than 30% of before-tax median household income for households with moderate or medium income in their region—this is, for example, essential workers such as construction workers and care providers. Then, obviously, there are market units as well, which will be delivered by BCH as part of mixed-income developments to partially support the cost of building affordable and deeply affordable units.
This was a really important adoption of this approach to affordability as part of the investment policy of Build Canada Homes. It will have a focus on social housing, and that will be a significant focus of the types of investments that it will be undertaking.
Liberal
Jean Yip Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Can you clarify what you were saying about construction workers and care workers?
Deputy Minister, Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities
I'll just give you an example. In areas where you have 30% of before-tax median income for households with moderate or medium income, that would be those types of workers.
There are areas where.... As Coleen has mentioned a number of times, affordability is a term that has some contextual requirements, and so in some areas the issue is social housing that's deeply affordable. I think that's one of the points that Ms. Hogan raised in her report. In other areas, the focus is around workers not being able to rent near the places where they work. For example, nurses in areas of Toronto can't afford to be there. We've heard from a lot of.... The Toronto Board of Trade, for example, has raised issues around manufacturing companies in Toronto that are having difficulty finding locations for their workers near them.
You need to know whom you're targeting in terms of the structuring of different developments, and that's why there's that specificity.
Liberal
Jean Yip Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Will there be housing on public lands near the areas of work that you just mentioned?
Deputy Minister, Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities
Build Canada Homes is not only going to build on public lands; that's one stream of the work. It will also be working with developers on private lands through financing, much in the way that CMHC has done in the past, so there's a flexibility there as well in terms of the approach.
Liberal
Jean Yip Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Ms. Hogan, do you have any comments on this definition of affordability?
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
I'm hearing it for the first time, as are all of you. I do acknowledge that affordability has a different meaning for different people. You do need some that are deeply affordable, which, I believe, should be based on the income of a household, and then you do need others that will meet different definitions, and some that can remain at market rent.
No program, I think, should try to accomplish all of it, but it sounds like lots of things are going to be moving here, so I look forward to a few years down the line, when we can audit it and see how it's going.
Liberal
Jean Yip Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Ms. Volk, in your opening statement, you mentioned that the federal lands initiative is one tool. What other tools do you have to resolve housing issues?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
The biggest tools are the affordable housing fund itself and the apartment construction loan program, which is bigger than that. This is a program that offers low-interest financing to developers of purpose-built rentals in exchange for commitments that they make to moderate some of the rents to make them more affordable, to have energy efficiency or accessibility, and other criteria in the program. In exchange for those, they have access to a low interest rate—essentially a subsidized interest rate—from the government, to allow them to make the math work on purpose-built rentals. That's an incredibly successful program. We're funding about $6 billion a year of purpose-built rentals through that program.
We have other, smaller programs, but of our other big tools, the big one is our mortgage loan insurance, which most Canadians know as something that they might need on their mortgage. An individual homebuyer might need to have insurance on his or her mortgage. More to the point, today we are doing $60 billion a year of insurance on purpose-built rentals, and that is an incredible contributor to a new supply of apartments in Canada.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Williamson
Thank you very much. That is your time.
Now we'll begin the last, abridged round, which will have three members.
Mr. Kuruc, you have the floor for five minutes, please.
Conservative
Ned Kuruc Conservative Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Thank you.
I would like to start with Ms. Hogan.
Could you please tell us how often your employees are required to work from the office and at home?
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
I have the ability to set terms and conditions for my employees, and they are slightly different than what the federal public service has. Right now, all of our executives—so anyone at the director level and above—is required to be in the office three days a week. For everyone else, it's two days. That being said, we are in the service industry, and at times we go out to entities to audit. We travel to the three territories, and people could be there working a full solid week or even over the weekend, just to get work done while they are out of town, and then they come back.
We have a slightly different expectation, but we find that it has its pros and cons no matter which way you look at it.
Conservative
Ned Kuruc Conservative Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Thank you.
I would like to ask the same question of Mr. Paul Halucha.
September 25th, 2025 / 12:30 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Housing, Infrastructure and Communities
We have a four-day-a-week compliance requirement for executives. That's how often they're in.
The discussion that Ms. Hogan just raised is interesting. We're actually in a place, as a department, where we don't have enough space for our employees to meet the three-day requirement. We will as of next spring. We just secured a couple of floors with PSPC's assistance, so we will be in full compliance with the three-day policy as early as possible in the new year.
Conservative
Ned Kuruc Conservative Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON
Thank you very much.
I have the same question for Ms. Volk, please.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
My answer is very similar to Paul's. We have a requirement for three days a week in person for most of our employees, and four days a week for executives. We, too, have space constraints. We are not able to meet that requirement in every one of our offices right now. We are acquiring space in our regional offices and in Ottawa to allow us to receive employees three days a week without having them sit two to a desk. We are moving towards that.
In Ottawa, which is our largest centre of employment, it will be done this fall and winter. We will have enough space for people to come back three days a week, four days a week for executives.