Thursday July 8, 2021 | COWICHAN VALLEY, BC [Updated at 4:25 pm]
by Mary P Brooke, Editor | Island Social Trends
Starting off what feels like the campaign trail by doing a Zoom-call pit stop wit media in Duncan today, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh stood in the bright island sunshine alongside local Member of Parliament Alistair MacGregor (Cowichan-Malahat-Langford) to address key issues.
As part of his party’s “fighting for people” theme, in particular Singh covered the urgent need for supply increases of both housing and child care.
Housing:
The history of Canada after World War II includes building hundreds of thousands of affordable-style homes, said Singh today. Now after the past 18 months of the COVID-19 pandemic, he proposes this is the time to take the same approach. Lack of adequate housing was a key factor in the spread of the COVID virus. People need space in their homes, and indeed they need a stable home situation as in having an affordable roof over their head.
This can be achieved through partnership with all levels of government, Singh said.
“Housing was a crisis before but got worse during the pandemic,” Singh told media today. “People want to stay in their communities around family and friends,” but can’t always afford to do so given the cost of housing and rentals today.
Many families are forced to spend over 41% of their income to put a roof over their heads, it was stated in an NDP news release today.
Singh says there has not been federal partnership in housing for decades. “The 1990’s was the last time we saw real investment in CMHC and building homes. Not since then have we seen any new cooperatives, not-for-profit housing or federally funded projects. There’s been a big gap in terms of investment at the federal level, municipalities have stepped up to try and be innovative, and we’ve seen BC do their best to try to increase opportunities for more housing,” he said. “We are calling for a really bold investment.”
That would be a two-pronged approach. That would involve tackling speculation with taxes on foreign investment in housing (similar to what BC has done provincially) and also tackling the incentives to do property flipping (the tax system encourages home upgrades with the intention to resell for a higher price) which drives up the cost of housing.
“Housing shoudl not be a commodity but a place to call home. We can do that if we put in the right policies,” said Singh today. That would include those aspects of tax speculation, addressing or adapting to the forces that are driving up the cost of housing, and “investing massively” with provinces and municipalities. The NDP Leader said it also means listening to the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) “as to laying out a really strong course as to what needs to be done with housing”.
For that, he says the federal leadership has not really been there. Singh says the rate of housing price increases has become worse during the last six years. He says the NDP will work to stop housing market speculation, bring in a foreign investment tax, and increase housing supply — pitching that another 500,000 homes be built in Canada “that people can afford”.
“Whether renting or owning a home, people need to be able to afford that, and not have to choose between rent, utilities or putting food on the table,” said MacGregor, who has heard this type of dilemma numerous times in the local region.
Singh told Island Social Trends that he will work with government at all levels (federal, provincial and municipal) as well as the FCM to make advances toward better housing for Canadians.
Heat dome & heat waves:
Federal standards for cooling and ventilation in homes was another question asked about by Island Social Trends today.
As affordable homes are built, they need to address aspects of low emissions, being “designed for the realities that we are up against”, said Jagmeet Singh. He is looking for “proactive solutions for the impacts of the climate crisis.”
He said that municipalities need to be guided to build homes that are equipped to deal with increases in temperature and the realities of what those communities need.
“Increasing temperatures and heat waves have to be incorporated into a plan to build these homes that are sustainable and can function for people in all communities,” the NDP leader said.
During the last week of June, there was an extreme heat wave (caused by a heat dome) in BC, in which over 700 deaths were recorded (that being four times the usual number of deaths for that given week in June). Many homes did not have air conditioning or adequate ventilation. The combined problem of extreme heat and smoky air is a reality for BC this summer.
Child care:
“It has been a long time,” said Singh, as to how long it has taken for child care to be provided universally across Canada.
“This has been a promise for over 20 years and they’ve not followed through on it,” he said about the federal government. “Now they’re making it again another big commitment on the eve of a potential election. In the summer when we know all signs are pointing to an August election, which does not have to happen. If they’re serious about this, they need to follow through — not just a flashy announcement,” said Singh.
“These are people, families, women who want to go back to work,” he said, but saying they can’t go back to work because they can’t find a place for their kids to be cared for. “Child care is vital, we need it as part of the recovery. I’m calling their bluff here. I want to see Justin Trudeau deliver on this and I’d be happy to work together to actually see child care implemented across this country.”
Reconciliation:
On the matter of the stark and tragic discovery of buried bodies on the sites of former Indian Residential Schools: “It is not a coincidence that there are grave sites at these residential institutions. They were designed to kill kids. They were not designed to raise them or to teach them but to strip them of their identity, language and culture and their lives,” said Jagmeet Singh today.
He added: “That’s something that demands additional steps of accountability. Appointing a special prosecutor to have that accountability is a powerful step forward. We need to see this Liberal government implement all the calls to action of the Truth and Reconciliation. Only a fraction of the calls to action have been implemented,” he said. In that way, Canada would “walk the path of reconciliation with real accountability”.
Recently in BC, Provincial Health Officer Dr Bonnie Henry said about the role of Indian Residential Schools and the discovery of bodies at the Kamloops location: “We are all implicated in this tragedy”.
What the NDP did during COVID:
“Who was there for you, who fought for you?”, said Singh today, in one of the more succinct pitches he has made about obvious progress achieved by the NDP for Canadians during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We brought in CERB, fighting hard to double it to $2,000. We made that happen. The Liberals had no support plan for students, we fought and brought in the emergency student benefit.” The NDP also brought in sick leave: “That was an NDP initiative.” He also itemized how the the wage subsidy (CEWS) was started by the government at 10% but was not enough to keep people employed. “We fought tooth and nail to bring that up to 75%.”
The NDP are “allies who will fight for you in Ottawa”, said Singh. “It was NDP that drove all the positive changes that improved the health of people during the pandemic.”
===== RELATED:
Trudeau announces early learning & child care agreement along with BC Premier John Horgan — statement from Prime minister’s office (July 8, 2021)
===== LINKS about CERB & CRB (articles by Island Social Trends)
Self-employed could see CRB eligibility period extension (June 23, 2021)
NDP fighting to keep CRB intact for self-employed (May 28, 2021)
NDP: small business still needs recovery support during pandemic (January 27, 2021)
CERB being shifted to new process through EI program (August 1, 2020)
CERB wrapping up, shifting to updated EI for employees and gig/contract workers (July 31, 2020)
CERB extension for 8 more weeks through summer 2020, says Trudeau (June 16, 2020)
CERB gets extended thanks to NDP pressure in minority scenario (June 15, 2020)