The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - Liberal Government isn’t listening or working to solve the housing crisis.

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome once again to The Blueprints. This is Canada's Conservative Podcast. I'm your

00:00:11.680 host, Jamie Schmael, Member of Parliament for Halliburton Corps at the Lakes Brock,

00:00:14.840 with new content for you every single Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. Don't forget to like,

00:00:19.580 comment, share and subscribe to this program. Tell your friends they can download it on

00:00:23.660 platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, you name it, it is out there. On today's

00:00:28.780 show, we are talking about housing and how to make it more affordable for Canadians. To do that,

00:00:33.540 we are bringing on the housing critic, the housing guru, Scott Aitchison, the Member of Parliament for

00:00:39.260 Parry Sound Muskoka, my next door neighbor geographically, and also a former mayor of

00:00:45.140 Huntsville, Ontario. Thanks for coming on the show. Always a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me,

00:00:48.720 Jamie. All right, with your experience, you know about housing. A little bit. So tell us about our

00:00:53.100 plan. I think it's a brilliant plan. And the broad brushstrokes are fairly simple.

00:00:58.140 What Pierre's promised to do is that when we form a government, when he's the Prime Minister,

00:01:02.160 not soon enough, but soon enough, when he is the Prime Minister, we will remove the federal sales tax

00:01:08.280 on the purchase of a new home under a million dollars. So this has the potential. So if somebody's

00:01:14.180 buying a house that's a million dollars, which is not unheard of in a lot of markets in our country,

00:01:19.840 that has the potential of saving them $50,000 on the purchase price. That works out to about $2,200

00:01:27.120 a year in mortgage payments. And so it's a massive drop in the price and the cost of government in

00:01:34.720 this process. So it's actually a very simple concept. It's instead of giving money to cities

00:01:39.240 and, you know, various different groups, this is like a cut, a cut so that Canadians pay less when

00:01:45.500 they buy their house. Yeah, I didn't think I needed to tee it up. And I really don't because

00:01:49.180 you addressed some of it. But I think no matter where you are in this country, the cost of housing

00:01:52.960 is out of control. Out of control. People of all ages, especially the young people, right? They went

00:01:57.860 from, you know, just graduating high school or approaching that, going to college, university.

00:02:02.240 They went to lockdowns to inflation, right? Like the whole world was in front of them. And all of a

00:02:06.760 sudden, you come out of this whole situation looking and trying to figure out how I'm ever

00:02:12.860 going to get out of my parents' basement. Absolutely. And of course, what a lot of the

00:02:17.320 Canadians don't realize, I don't think, is that in the cost to build a home, you know, there's all

00:02:22.320 kinds of costs related to build a home. But the majority of that cost, the biggest chunk of that

00:02:27.680 cost, not the majority, but the biggest chunk of that cost is government fees and charges.

00:02:31.860 Yep. About 33% is the average across this country. 33%.

00:02:36.300 So how do you build affordable housing, in most cases, to get the permits and the surveys,

00:02:41.880 et cetera, et cetera? How do you build affordable housing if you're behind the eight ball before

00:02:46.980 you get a shovel in the ground? Yeah. This is the problem. This is the

00:02:50.000 problem right now, is that all levels of government are involved, too. You know, I hear from people

00:02:54.300 all the time, oh, housing's not a federal issue. All levels of government are involved in

00:02:59.100 this gig. The gig is up on government. So federal sales taxes, provincial sales taxes,

00:03:05.400 all on the cost of every stick of lumber, everything that goes into that house. That's

00:03:11.220 a huge amount of money. In Ontario, it's 13%. 13% on everything, right? And so there's that. And

00:03:18.660 then the purchase of the home, the province charges land transfer taxes. Of course. And then,

00:03:24.480 in the city of Toronto, they're permitted to charge precisely double the land transfer

00:03:28.420 section. You pay it twice in the city of Toronto. And then at the local level, there's all the fees

00:03:33.920 and charges. So you can imagine, you know, if the builder wants to build a subdivision, well,

00:03:39.480 they've got to go through all the, you know, the municipal approvals process, right? So that

00:03:43.800 means you have to pay the fees for a subdivision plan approval. There's all kinds of studies and

00:03:49.480 reports that, that municipalities demand for everything from, you know, what's going to

00:03:55.580 happen to, you know, the, the butterflies in that area to how much more, why did we have to make the

00:04:01.860 road where the subdivision is going to be? And so they have to do all these studies and reports. It

00:04:06.700 can take years. Time is money. That costs a lot of money to do that. Then of course, when they get

00:04:13.140 the approvals finally to build that subdivision, they have to build all the infrastructure in it,

00:04:17.920 right? All the roads, all the power lines, all the water and sewer lines. They build all those

00:04:23.120 things as part of the cost of building the subdivision. And then each single lot, they're

00:04:29.580 charged a development charge on top of all of the things they've already built. So they built all

00:04:34.000 the infrastructure and then they get charged a development charge for any potential more growth

00:04:40.260 related things that have to happen because of this new subdivision. And they have to pay. Here's the

00:04:45.620 thing. They have to pay those development charges, which in some places are over a hundred thousand

00:04:50.500 dollars a lot. Just for the lot, just for the privilege of building a house. It's a hundred

00:04:55.840 thousand dollars, right? So they have to pay that up front. And often cases, because it takes a long

00:05:00.120 time to build a subdivision, they've got to pay that up front and they got to borrow the money to make it

00:05:04.300 work. So they're borrowing the money and all these costs, all these costs, they go right to the bottom

00:05:09.380 line. It makes that all put on the final price. Yeah. So if you have, if you're paying a million

00:05:13.440 dollars for a house in a subdivision and somewhere in the 905, for example, in any one of our

00:05:19.480 communities, you know, about $300,000 of that cost of that home goes all to government, all to

00:05:26.780 government. And think about the amount of money that young people have to borrow to pay off that

00:05:31.700 $300,000 in government charges and fees. It's, it's no wonder that young people have just started

00:05:38.460 to give up the hope of ever owning a home. And are people getting value for the money? I guess

00:05:42.820 that's up to the individual to decide. But at the same time, the largest conversation I hear many

00:05:49.200 people talk about at the doors is getting the prices, the pricing of, the price of a house under

00:05:55.180 control, but also making it affordable for new people. But as we just discussed, with every little

00:06:00.960 bit layered on top of the price of housing, it's very difficult to actually make that happen.

00:06:07.360 Especially if you have a developer trying to make, say, tiny homes, for example, right? If,

00:06:12.260 even if you are hammered with these fees beforehand, it's, it's still difficult to get that price point

00:06:19.020 correct. Absolutely it is. Absolutely it is. And here, and here's the really crazy thing, right? I mean,

00:06:23.840 what you have is a situation in this country where all levels of government are making it like

00:06:28.260 bandits on housing. They are making a lot of money on housing. And, and so our plan, you know,

00:06:34.280 obviously reduces the amount of money the federal government will make on housing. And of course,

00:06:38.160 you hear the liberals complaining, oh, you know, how are you going to pay for that? How are you

00:06:40.740 going to pay for that? Well, we'll pay for it by canceling these stupid liberal programs. They're 1.00

00:06:46.120 stupid. That are just making prices more expensive. Just make it more expensive. You're making the 1.00

00:06:50.120 housing more expensive. And then what they're doing with this, like the housing accelerator fund is a good

00:06:54.280 example. It's a $4 billion fund, borrowed money too, by the way, since they're so indefinite,

00:06:59.500 it's borrowed money. They take that $4 billion, and then they give it to municipalities based on

00:07:05.480 the promise that they'll be better on housing. So case in point, there's lots of examples, but I'll

00:07:10.080 use Toronto as the first example. City of Toronto put in their application for their housing accelerator

00:07:15.280 fund, and they got the biggest chunk of money of anybody. Obviously it's the biggest city,

00:07:19.500 $471 million for the city of Toronto. And before the ink was dry on that agreement,

00:07:25.600 they raised their development charges by 42%. Wasn't that on top of another increase that

00:07:30.820 happened just prior to? Yep, absolutely. Yeah. So now the development charge in the city of Toronto

00:07:37.060 is $117,000. That's incredible. So they got $471 million, and they made it more expensive. And

00:07:44.520 housing starts are down. The more expensive you make it, the slower the starts are going to be.

00:07:49.720 Absolutely. Because your market shrinks. Your available marketplace, your available buyers

00:07:54.240 starts to shrink. The solution to the housing crisis in this country, Jamie, is the most classically

00:07:59.580 small C conservative solution you can imagine. It's less government. That's right. Less government.

00:08:04.480 One of the mottos of this show. All right, let's queue up cut one. We have basically a quick clip

00:08:09.740 outlining the announcement that our leader did, and with your help as well as the housing critic.

00:08:16.320 But it seems to get, or has gotten so far, widespread compliments from across the aisle. So let's play cut one.

00:08:23.560 I looked to the opinion of Mike Moffat, the housing policy expert on this, and he said that it was

00:08:30.900 not quite, but almost perfect. He said that there was no other better policy put forward to date

00:08:36.020 in terms of addressing accessibility to housing for middle-class Canadians. So I look to that,

00:08:41.380 and I see, you know, a pretty, you know, validating stakeholder there endorsing the conservative

00:08:46.800 policy. I also look at where Canadians are at in terms of, you know, the age demographic that is

00:08:53.020 most concerned about housing, and that's millennials, 30 to 45, and millennials are, yes, in their 40s now.

00:08:59.100 And as they look to buy a house, which looks impossible for all of us, we look towards any policy that'll

00:09:04.900 make that a little bit easier. So I can see why Canadians trust conservatives the most on housing

00:09:10.580 above any other party, because conservatives are the only party that's talking to young Canadians

00:09:15.680 on the issues that they care about. Now, we are able, as a party, as a government-in-waiting, if you

00:09:22.200 will, get the provinces to get on board with this. This could be even better for those looking to get

00:09:28.900 into the housing market. This could really accelerate and probably alleviate some of the numbers that

00:09:34.260 we are seeing in terms of people looking for housing, and the prices as well.

00:09:37.820 It could be huge. And as you know, Jamie, Pierre has actually written to all the premiers, encouraging

00:09:43.580 them to follow suit, to do the exact same thing. So the federal sales tax is 5%. In Ontario, the

00:09:50.540 provincial sales tax is 8%. Now imagine if you drop the price of that home another 8%. This is huge.

00:09:57.820 This could be huge. It really, really dramatically impact the price of a home in this country. And so

00:10:04.260 Pierre has, I think, done an amazing job of leading on this issue. He's calling on premiers to follow

00:10:12.100 suit because, you know, they make even more money on housing than the federal government does. And I,

00:10:17.060 honestly, I mean, Mike Moffitt is, as Cole suggested, he is an expert on this file, and he thinks the move is

00:10:23.420 brilliant because he points out all the time that governments make too much money on housing. He likes

00:10:28.500 to hammer away at local governments. And he's not necessarily a friend to conservatives either. So

00:10:33.780 for him to come out and say that. No, he's, I wouldn't say, I wouldn't say he's terribly partisan at

00:10:38.480 all, actually, but he's definitely not, you know, he's not a card character, let's put it that way. But he

00:10:43.920 does understand that governments make too much money on housing. And he likes to continue to point out,

00:10:48.640 too, that at the same time, the federal, you know, this announcement that Pierre has made that a federal

00:10:52.860 government under him would remove the federal sales tax. You know, cities still make too much

00:10:59.140 money on housing, and they need to do the same kind of thing. In fact, I just did a video. I call

00:11:05.440 out cities all over the place for the huge charges and the delays and the long, painful process people

00:11:11.200 have to go through to get a home built. And I just did a video on Muskoka, you know, my backyard. I used

00:11:17.540 to be a city council, a town, not a town, not a city council, town council and a mayor in Huntsville,

00:11:21.760 as you said. And the district of Muskoka just approved a plan to increase their development

00:11:27.840 charges by 30%. I just did a video on this. I said, this is wrong. So at the federal level,

00:11:34.040 when Pierre is prime minister, we're going to do our part, but cities and regions and towns,

00:11:38.200 they're going to do their part, too. We've got to make it cheaper to build.

00:11:40.940 I know the goal is to let the builders build, right? Because the builders will provide the housing

00:11:45.940 that the market needs, right? Usually not one more unit than the market needs, right? Or else

00:11:51.220 you'd see a change in the price. It affects the price. But at the end of the day, do we have a

00:11:55.780 specific goal on how many homes we're hoping to spark with this announcement? So are they

00:12:00.200 accelerate with construction? Or is it basically as many as we can get on that the market can afford

00:12:06.080 to absorb? It's a great question. And our conservative estimates are that this move alone,

00:12:11.080 just the federal sales tax being removed from the cost of homes, will generate the construction

00:12:15.760 of at least 30,000 more homes a year. So now imagine, you know, in Ontario, if the province,

00:12:21.380 you know, reduced, you know, their fees as well, their taxes, you know, you could really start

00:12:25.760 ramping this up. I mean, the CMHC has said we need to build millions of homes, millions of homes,

00:12:30.540 right? And so now you now start combining this with some of the other things that we've committed

00:12:34.820 to do, like axing the carbon tax, you know, carbon taxes on all the materials that go into a house

00:12:39.960 as well, right? So you reduce that now, reduce carbon, eliminate the carbon tax, eliminate the

00:12:45.780 sales tax on homes at the federal level. Now you're really ramping up, you know, getting homes built,

00:12:52.620 getting them built cheaper. This is going to have a massive impact. I mean, getting government out of

00:12:58.680 the way, reducing the cost of government in this process, in all these different ways, honestly,

00:13:03.840 we'll be able to get a lot more homes built and Canadians will be able to afford them again.

00:13:07.460 We're almost out of time, but I remiss, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that yesterday was

00:13:12.300 Remembrance Day and we were in our constituencies, we were attending Remembrance Day services

00:13:16.600 to commemorate those who have fought for our freedom, paid the ultimate sacrifice, but also

00:13:21.540 for those that continue to serve today or have served in conflict or in peacetime home or at home

00:13:28.120 or abroad. Thank you everyone for your service who has done that. And as you know, the guests get the

00:13:34.940 last word, so the floor is yours. You can talk about whatever you want.

00:13:38.940 Well, I love talking about housing. I don't know if it shows or not.

00:13:41.060 Yes, you're passionate. That's why you're the critic. It's a good thing.

00:13:43.500 I've got to tell you, I'm really excited about this announcement that Pierre's made. It's

00:13:48.700 precisely the kind of thing that we need to do. It shows real leadership. You know, we can't

00:13:54.220 get this current Liberal government out there fast enough. We need to make Pierre Pauly of the Prime

00:13:58.840 Minister. We need to get these things done and get them done fast and we can get this country moving

00:14:02.660 again. Scott Acheson, member of Parliament for Paris Saint-Moscoc, also the critic for housing.

00:14:07.040 Appreciate your time. What a great note to end on. We appreciate yours as well. As Scott said,

00:14:12.320 we want Pierre to be the next Prime Minister of Canada. I'm sure you do too, but we need your help.

00:14:16.820 You need to like, comment, subscribe and share this program. Tell your friends they can download

00:14:21.540 it on platforms like CastBox, iTunes, Google Play and Spotify because we need the ears to hear this

00:14:26.840 message. You're probably not getting it in the mainstream media. Great way to do so. Don't forget,

00:14:30.980 we have new content for you every single Tuesday, 1.30 p.m. Eastern Time. Until next week,

00:14:35.560 remember, low taxes, less government, more freedom. That's the blue.

The Blueprint: Canada's Conservative Podcast - November 12, 2024

Liberal Government isn’t listening or working to solve the housing crisis.

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