A federal housing-related grant of $31.5 million to the City of sa国际传媒 was both praised as a wise investment and denounced as a waste of money at an election forum.聽
Liberal candidate Stephen Fuhr said the funds are helping the city to streamline its approval process for new housing but Conservative candidate Tracy Gray said the grant would do nothing to make housing more affordable in sa国际传媒.聽
鈥淎ccording to sa国际传媒, this money has been very helpful to them and if itsa国际传媒 built-out in its entirety it will deliver 950 homes faster than would otherwise have been built if they didn鈥檛 get this funding,鈥 Fuhr said.
Fuhr said many Conservative MPs supported the $4.4 billion Housing Accelerator Fund, through which sa国际传媒 received its $31.5 million allotment last year, but Gray did not. 鈥淭he one sitting next to me didn鈥檛 support that money for this community. Which I find not awesome,鈥 Fuhr said.
But Gray suggested the federal fund mainly benefited the municipal governments that received the money while doing nothing to reduce the price of housing. Meanwhile, new home starts across Canada are at 1970 levels and in many communities are declining, she said.聽
鈥淭he results are actually going down. The current government has a philosophy of building bureaucracies instead of building homes,鈥 Gray said.聽
According to the city, it has used money it received so far from the HAF to change bylaws, do technical reviews, make regulatory revisions, study density allotments, introduce an online permitting system, and upgrade digital systems.聽
A Conservative government would provide incentives to municipalities to reduce various building fees and charges, eliminate the GST on new home purchases, and take other measures that would reduce the cost of a new home by as much as $100,000, Gray said.聽
鈥淚 will support, any day, money going into the pockets of Canadians rather than bureaucracies,鈥 Gray said.聽
Fuhr said a broader approach than tax cuts and a reduction in municipal fees was necessary to spur homebuilding. 鈥淭he Conservative approach, of tax cuts and incentives, is going to build a certain type of home, maybe, but itsa国际传媒 certainly not going to build out the broad range of housing that we need,鈥 Fuhr said.聽
Though the format of the debate did not allow for direct exchanges between candidates, or even rebuttals to what was said previously, there were clear points of difference made by Gray and Fuhr in support of their respective parties鈥 policies. Here are some examples:聽
CARBON TAXES
Although the Liberals have scrapped the consumer carbon tax, Fuhr said he was still a believer in such measures to address climate change. Asked if he thought carbon taxes were an effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Fuhr said: 鈥淓very expert on the planet has said it was the most cost-effective way to do this. But unfortunately, 38 or 39 per cent of the Conservative Party made so much noise about this, that it became unpalatable. Doesn鈥檛 mean we鈥檙e going to abandon it. It just means itsa国际传媒 going to have to be applied in a different way.鈥
Gray said the Conservatives would embrace other measures to reduce GHG emissions including more hydro-electric power, power from tidal generating stations, and support for LNG expansion and export. 鈥淲e want to focus on technology, not taxes,鈥 Gray said. 鈥淭heresa国际传媒 a lot of things we can do not only for ourselves here in Canada but also to help other countries around the world as well.鈥
INTERPROVINCIAL TRADE聽
Reducing barriers to interprovincial trade is critical given the current continental trade war and the prospect of more U.S. tariffs on Canadian imports, Fuhr said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e the masters of our own domain in this, so we have to get it done,鈥 Fuhr said. 鈥淭hat really is what is going to get our country through this trade war with our largest trading partner.鈥
Fuhr noted Liberal leader Mark Carney has said the Liberals would ensure 鈥渇ree trade鈥 within Canada by this Canada Day.
But Gray scoffed at the likelihood of that actually happening. 鈥淭he Liberal record for interprovincial trade is incredibly dismal,鈥 she said, citing what she said were more than 100 pages in the current relevant trade documents that outline various impediments to the free cross-border flow of goods and services within Canada.聽
鈥淭here have been lots of promises made by the Liberal government on this and very, very little action,鈥 Gray said.聽
IMMIGRATION
Gray said the Liberal government had 鈥渂roken鈥 the immigration system by allowing hundreds of thousands of more newcomers into Canada than had been the case in recent years. 鈥淲e need to make sure that, for the immigration levels, we have the jobs, the health care, and the housing in order to supply them,鈥 Gray said.聽
Fuhr said the annual immigration target had 鈥渂allooned鈥 from 350,000 to 500,000, which he suggested the Liberals had now realized was a mistake. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e re-prioritizing, and they鈥檙e going back down towards 350,000 people,鈥 Fuhr said.聽
CRIME AND SAFETY
A sa国际传媒 resident recently told Gray that someone tried to light her fence on fire, and a shopkeeper told her he had to spend an additional $30,000 on store security systems. Crime is the issue she hears about most often on the campaign trail, Gray said.聽
鈥淭his is the direct result of Liberal soft-on-crime laws,鈥 she said. The Liberals had removed minimum sentences from serious offences like drug trafficking and gun smuggling, she said, and it was commonplace for criminals to re-offend after being freed on bail or serving light sentences.聽
鈥淭heresa国际传媒 very little serious ramifications for serial criminals,鈥 Gray said, promising a Conservative government would address the situation. 鈥淲e need to focus on victims and not give offenders a pass.鈥
For his part, Fuhr said he 鈥渁greed with Tracy鈥 that property crimes by repeat offenders were a problem in sa国际传媒. 鈥淚 hear it a ton on the doorstep, too. Itsa国际传媒 particularly bad in sa国际传媒 and it does need to be dealt with,鈥 Fuhr said.聽
The Liberal crime plan involves more policing and changing what he called the 鈥渞evolving door鈥 of the justice system. That will require significant changes to the laws and current practices, Fuhr said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e all going to have to get in a room and figure out what that looks like,鈥 he said.聽
PARTING THOUGHTS
In their closing comments, both Fuhr and Gray delivered distillations of their respective parties core messaging to voters as the April 28 election draws near.
Fuhr said Carney, a former governor of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, was a 鈥渃risis manager and world renowned economist鈥 who is well-suited to leading Canada through as its relationship with the U.S. fractures under President Donald Trump.
鈥淗e really is the right guy for the job,鈥 Fuhr said of Carney. Fuhr also said he was successful as Liberal MP for sa国际传媒 between 2015 and 2019 in landing big federal grants and would be so again if elected again as part of a Liberal government.聽
Gray said the Liberals, in the wake of the resignation of former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, are asking Canadians to simply forget what she termed a 鈥渓ost decade鈥 under Liberal government.聽
鈥淭he Liberals want you to forget the last 10 years. They have swapped out Justin Trudeau for his economic advisor,鈥 Gray said. Under the Liberals, taxes are up and investment is down, and both inflation and crime have increased.聽
鈥淲e need a change, we need a dramatic change. If you want your taxes lowered, if you want less red tape and bureaucracy, if you want more opportunity for Canada, if you want more jobs for Canadians, if you want crime to go down, if you want mental health and addiction and recovery to be a focus, if you want more opportunity, development of our natural resources, if you want Canada to be more self-sustaining, then you need to vote Conservative,鈥 Gray said.聽
