Skip to main content

“I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.” ~~ John G. Diefenbaker

Recent Affordable Housing Investment Plan report indicates it’s actually going to take 37 and a half years to reach that lofty NDP goal


Last Thursday (October 31st), the BC Liberals called on Premier John Horgan, and Housing Minister Selina Robinson to, as they said, come clean with British Columbians who trusted them to build affordable housing. 

Kamloops MLA and Housing Critic Todd Stone stated last week that:


“John Horgan has let down the very people he made the biggest promise to in the last election. To mislead British Columbians, especially the most vulnerable people in our communities who need safe housing, is simply reprehensible,” said BC Liberal Housing Critic and MLA for Kamloops-South Todd Stone.

BC’s Housings Affordable Housing Investment Plan (AHIP) Report for 2019 / 2020 related how the government of John Horgan, in the Budget Update for 2017, and the 2018 Budget, had committed nearly $7 billion in funds.

“After promising to build 114,000 homes over 10 years, we are now two and a half years into that plan and just over 2,200 units have been completed”, related Stone, who then continued;

“At this rate, it would take Horgan’s NDP government over 100 years to meet their target.”

Again, looking to the governments own recent AHIP report, it showed that as of June 30th, BC Housing has just over 13 thousand (13,182) homes in various stages of development, construction, or competition.


The seven categories, for the funding program, show competition numbers of: 


  • 71 for Affordable Rental Housing 
  • 1,428 units for Rapid Response to Homelessness 
  • Deepening Affordability of Existing Programs has 350 completed units 
  • BOTH the Community Housing Fund, and the Indigenous Housing Fund, have ZERO completed units 
  • there are 358 units for Supportive Housing and .... 
  • just 72 under the heading of the Women’s Transition Housing Fund


That comes to a total of just 2,279 housing units that have been completed under the current term of BC’s NDP government.  Twenty-two hundred and seventy-nine units of the 13,182 alleged to be in development of completed, or of the twenty-two thousand claimed by the NDP.

That is NOT a very good record, in my opinion, of delivering on the governments commitment to increase the supply of affordable, social, and supportive housing. A record which the government itself also states should be measured by the number of units completed.

On page 11, of BC’s Housings Affordable Housing Investment Plan, the authors report the 2019 / 20 completion target is set to be three thousand and thirty-five (3,035) homes ... that of the 114,00-goal promised by the NDP over the next decade. 
 
Kamloops South Thompson MLA,
and Housing Critic, Todd Stone
At that rate, it is actually going to take 37 and a half years to reach that lofty goal!  No wonder then that the BC Liberal’s are saying the NDP government’s housing plan is a complete failure. Furthermore, that their own report, which the Liberals say government has been keeping from the public, shows over half of promised units don’t even have funding committed to them.

When I asked Stone about low income families, and their need for safe and affordable housing, he reported to me only 71 Affordable Rental Housing Units have been delivered.  He also indicated fully six in ten projects are behind schedule, further compounding problems for mothers, children, and those vulnerable because of a insufficient.

“Housing Minister Selina Robinson has spent an awful lot of energy doing photo ops and re-announcing BC Liberal projects. What she seems to spend little time on is actually getting projects funded and shovels in the ground,” concluded Housing Critic Todd Stone.

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

WARD STAMER: “Hopefully he’s actually listening to what people have to say, and not just showing up for a photo op”

In his latest travels across the province, BC Forest Minister Ravi Parmar touched down in the Okanagan. A trip essentially, he said, to be on the ground meeting industry people. I read what he had to say, and about how he has been tasked with getting more timber to market. Let me start by saying, “ He hasn’t been tasked. He and Premier Eby guaranteed 45 million cubic metres of available wood fibre – they guaranteed that .” BC Timber Sales is a government agency within the provincial forest’s ministry, which is responsible for managing a portion of the province's Crown timber; specifically, 20 percent of the province's annual allowable cut. Unfortunately, BC Timber Sales did not provide anywhere near that amount last year, it was just 12.2 percent. Three years ago, BC mills cut 52 million metres of wood, bringing in nearly $2 billion dollars to the provincial treasury. That figure doesn’t include the taxes from 55,700 people directly employed in the industry, nor from the tens o...
Post a Comment
Read more

Conservative Opposition demonstrates focused and policy-oriented approach in first four weeks of the legislative session

In the first four weeks of the legislative session, the Conservative Official Opposition has scored significant policy wins as it proves every day that the Conservative team has fresh ideas and real-world experience to bring to the table. At the same time, the NDP government has been listless, struggling to find a policy agenda that addresses the problems that British Columbians are facing. “This NDP government led by David Eby has tried to do everything under the sun to distract from their disastrous fiscal record and the fact that they are utterly out of ideas,” said Conservative Opposition Leader John Rustad. “They’ve tried to use the U.S. President to deflect from their eye-popping $11 billion deficit, the worst business confidence in the country, and the fact that they’ve created almost zero private sector jobs. This is no way to run a province or an economy.” Since the legislative session started on February 18th with the Throne Speech, the opposition...
Post a Comment
Read more

Conservative Party of BC Calls for Coroner’s Inquest in the Death of Chantelle Williams

  Chantelle Williams/Facebook “Somebody has to come out and tell the truth on what happened and who’s at fault” ~~ Martin Watts, Uncle of Chantelle Williams The Conservative Party of BC is urgently calling for a coroner’s inquest into the death of 18-year-old Indigenous youth Chantelle Williams, who tragically died under the care of Usma Nuu-chah-nulth Family and Child Services, an agency of the Ministry of Children and Family Development. Her family is disturbed by the lack of transparency and unanswered questions surrounding her final moments, and are seeking answers on who was responsible for her care and supervision and why no one noticed she was missing until it was too late. Chantelle was found unresponsive in Port Alberni in the early morning of January 28, 2025. She was later pronounced dead in the hospital. Temperatures had dropped below –7°C the night of her death. Her family is demanding clarity on the circumstances that led to her untimely passing, and they demand answ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Labels

Show more