Housing Plan on the Campaign Trail

The Liberals have released a campaign platform (Build Canada Homes) for the Parliamentary election to be held on 28 April 2025.  The platform includes a new housing initiative.  Here, I’ll give a brief history of the national housing acts in Canada, present the details of the current plan, identify the main shortcoming in this proposed initiative, and look to the future.

The History

The Canadian government built housing after World War II.  Canada passed the National Housing Act (NHA) a year before entering WWIi.  Following Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King strong victory in 1935, the majority Liberals government passed the NHA. 

The National Housing Act of 1938 was the second of four housing Acts passed within a span of 19 years.  The stated purpose of the ACT is to “promote housing affordability and choice, …. And generally, contribute to the well-being of the housing sector on the national economy.” 

Canada adopted nine amendments between 1948 and 2007.  We are currently experiencing, in 2025, the longest span of time between changes to the national housing policy: the 18 years since 2007 amendment was adopted.  Since the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) was founded in 1945, it is responsible for administering the Act.

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The Details

Canada has a new housing policy put forward by the Mark Carney led Liberal Party.  They’re committed to building nearly 500,000 new homes each year.  The Liberal government will facilitate this monumental task through the creation of a new level of bureaucracy: Build Canada Homes (BCH).

BCH will work separately from CMHC.  In fact, the administration of two programs will be transferred from CMHC to BCH:

1. the Affordable Housing Fund
2. the Federal Lands Initiative

BCH will work directly with the private sector in several ways.  Two notable ones are:

1. As a developer, manage projects and partner with builders
2. Issue bulk orders for pre-fab homes from manufacturers

The Money

BCH will administer several financial aspects of the revitalized housing sector:

1. $25 billion in debt financing to the Canadian housing industry
2. $1 billion in equity financing to Canadian pre-fab companies
3. $10 billion in low-cost financing to affordable home builders

This $10 billion will be allocated on a 40-40-20 split.  $4 billion going towards long-term fixed-rate financing for affordable home builders.  $4 billion spread out among a variety of initiatives: deeply affordable housing, supportive housing, Indigenous housing, and shelters.  The remaining $2 billion will be directed towards student and senior housing.

Will BCH be a corporation?  A crown corp.  That remains to be seen.  The Liberal’s campaign promotion material calls it an “entity.”

The Oversight

The most significant task before the BCH corporation is to streamline processes at lower levels of government.  It will reduce bureaucracy at the lower levels of government by addressing zoning restrictions and other red tape issues, such as municipal development charges and tax incentives.  Some other specific changes include accelerating municipal permitting, eliminating duplicative inspections, streamlining regulations for pre-fab manufacturing, pre-approve standardized designs across the country, allow simultaneous applications of multiple projects by a single contractor, fast track some applications based on previous, reform and simplify the building code.

Some of these changes will be made through a national plan.  Professionals in the building sector will be able to move through the process as if it were “one national housing market” instead of “thirteen provincial housing markets.”

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The Shortcomings

The biggest failure of this initiative concerns energy efficiency.   The Liberal Party’s plan limits itself to three environmental features: certified wood, recycled content, and low-emissions materials.  Let’s address these one-by-one.  Certified wood may sound good, but what we really need is wood that is sustainably grown in Canada.  That shouldn’t be a bragging point.  It’s expected.  Basic.  Build a list of environmental features and processes beginning with that foundation.

Recycled content is over-hyped.  Multiple studies have shown that recycling has among the lowest effects on greenhouse gas emissions.  Yet, it is consistently believed by the general population to be highly effect, … more effective than it actually is.

Low-emission materials are a good, solid way to promote environmental sustainability.  However, it should be secondary to any of several environmental building standards: Passive House, LEED, R-2000, and Net-Zero.  Any of these is better than a conventional building.  Passive House is the only building standard that consistently produces buildings that consume quantifiably less energy during the structure’s lifetime (one-tenth of the energy of a conventional building).  LEED may get there depending on choices made during the development, but it’s not guaranteed.  Net-Zero will use less energy than is purchased from a utility. However, a reduced overall consumption is not guaranteed or consistently realized.  R-2000 doesn’t have the track record. It also doesn’t collect the necessary data to ensure a dramatic reduction of energy consumption over a building’s lifetime.

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The Future

The most recent amendment to the National Housing Act was 18 years ago.  The last replacement of the National Housing Act was 71 years ago.   Houses have a typical life expectancy of 70-100 years.  The first national housing act, called the Dominion Housing Act, is now 90 years old.  We are over due to replace existing stock and accelerate the building of more housing, … much more housing.  Action needs to happen quickly and with an eye towards reducing operational energy consumption during the lifetime of these new homes.  We need more homes built quickly through Build Canada Homes, and more buildings that meet or exceed the Passive House standard or a standard that improves on Passive House.