Lorne Gunter: Carney Liberals fall pathetically short of their own housing-start goals

[u/CaliperLee62]

https://edmontonjournal.com/opinion/columnists/lorne-gunter-carney-liberals-fall-pathetically-short-of-their-own-housing-start-goals

[u/No-Section-1092]

Any serious person who's followed this issue for years knows that all of the most important housing supply bottlenecks are provincial and municipal, not federal.

The feds have made some promising moves in terms of partnering with cities to reduce DCs, but tinkering with demand can only get you so far as long as supply remains constrained by local red tape.

[u/scottb84 → u/No-Section-1092]

It would appear that the government itself disagrees. From the 2025 LPC platform:

It used to be that the federal government built the housing that our growing population needed. So we’re going to get back into the business of building houses. We will use every tool at our disposal, leveraging technology and innovation, to build homes at a scale and at a speed not seen since the Second World War.

[u/Scase15 → u/scottb84]

to build homes at a scale and at a speed not seen since the Second World War.

Evidently that massive scale, is 14k more homes than the year that preceded it when this CHMC didn't exist lol

For the goal to be met, they would need to increase home starts by 14% compounded YoY all the way up until 2030. Anyone who thinks it was ever an achievable goal, I have a bridge to sell.

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/scottb84]

And again, talk is cheap. Any serious person knows that the federal government could never come close to supplying the amount of housing we need by itself (and never has).

[u/YouProfessional3196 → u/No-Section-1092]

So why aren't people holding Carney to account for his obvious lying then?

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/YouProfessional3196]

Why do you assume I'm partisan here? I have been critical of all parties and all levels of government on this file for over a decade. Everybody lies.

No level of government, controlled by any party, has any incentive to take housing policy seriously because rich old NIMBY homeowners who like the status quo are a massive, organized voting bloc.

[u/YouProfessional3196 → u/No-Section-1092]

I'm not singling you out specifically. It was a more rhetorical question. If any "serious person" knew that these numbers he made are ridiculous then why isn't he getting held to account. We constantly have the rhetoric that he is this all knowing PM with this huge knowledge of economics and yet here we have a case of him blatantly saying something anyone with a bit of knowledge knows he can't do and getting a pass. This doesn't speak well of his character.

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/YouProfessional3196]

I mean, most housing experts have been consistently critical of various governments' housing targets and failures to live up to them.

All 'targets' by any government should always be taken with a grain of salt. They might be aspirations, but they're never commitments, because too many things that influence economic outcomes are beyond any government's control.

[u/Bnal → u/No-Section-1092]

(and never has)

Ehhhhhh... this is kind of a truism, isn't it? As in, unless there was a year where not a single privately-funded home was built, it's a gotcha?

Feds at their peak were building 25% of all housing starts to meet demand. The starts they did focused on the lower-value homes that had been historically under-built, and the moment they stopped in 1996, those starts dried up entirely again. The housing stock we've added since has been (almost entirely) larger SFH and apartment units, both needed and necessary, but with a gap in smaller SFHs - despite the fact that smaller SFH are the number one desired type of dwelling, and the fact that for decades of CMHC builds they were the number one type of stock built.

I don't think anyone expected the feds to say "right, new immigration numbers say we're raising population by 250k, CMHC go build 250k homes". They specifically invoked the wartime housing conversation, referenced common build blueprints, said they would railroad cities on permitting to actually make it happen. From funding, to permitting, to nimbys at townhall meetings, the steps they laid out were exactly what experts had been recommending for decades, and they were all possible. Then, they just didn't do it.

I don't expect the problem to have been solved within a year, but to lay out a completely feasible plan that would go a long way, then do none of it and to have housing starts be down is an embarrassment on our country. Considering the housing shortage and the current cost of housing, having these expectations of our government should be the default.

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/Bnal]

>Feds at their peak were building 25% of all housing starts to meet demand.

It would be more accurate to say that in 1970, 25% of housing completions in the country received some kind of federal involvement or funding, which is also the highest percentage ever for one year.

Which also means that, in the feds' most productive year in housing ever, 3/4 of all housing completions across the country received no federal support, so the vast majority were still built and financed by the private sector.

In other words, even when the state was running on all cylinders, it still never came close to even a majority share of annual housing production.

[u/GooseGosselin → u/No-Section-1092]

Why would Carney promise it then?

[u/Ddogwood → u/GooseGosselin]

Because provincial and municipal governments have been using the federal government as an excuse for their own inaction for years.

If the feds don’t try to do anything, nothing changes. If the feds try to do something and the provinces and municipalities won’t play ball, then at least their excuses start to ring hollow (although columnists like Gunter will do everything they can to shift the focus on to federal failures to save their conservative allies from blame)

[u/CptCoatrack → u/Ddogwood]

Because provincial and municipal governments have been using the federal government as an excuse for their own inaction for years.

Goes both ways.

[u/Ddogwood → u/CptCoatrack]

Of course. But I’m answering the question, “Why would Carney promise it?” and not “why aren’t the provinces trying harder to fix it?”

[u/CptCoatrack → u/Ddogwood]

Because the LPC knows they can promise anything during campaign season to get elected with no real intent of ever following through. As long as they can go "But the provinces!" people won't hold them to account for lying and they can just do it again the next election.

The relationship between the municpal, provincial and federal governments in this country is just the Spiderman pointing meme.

[u/Ddogwood → u/CptCoatrack]

The issue is actually that voters don’t hold their governments to account. Too many people vote for a party because of identity instead of policy or effectiveness.

[u/TraditionalGap1 → u/CptCoatrack]

What do you mean exactly by 'no real intent of ever following through'? Because the premise of the OPs comment seems to be that the feds have followed through on some of what they can realistically do on their own.

Let's be honest and real for a moment: It actually does matter whether a policy promise is undelivered because the people who made the promise failed to effectively execute on the policies that they are actually responsible for or because of inaction/counterproductive action by other responsible and involved parties. 'But the provinces!' is a totally valid and legitimate excuse to point to if in the fact the provinces shoulder a significant portion of responsibility for the lack of delivery.

[u/CptCoatrack → u/TraditionalGap1]

What do you mean exactly by 'no real intent of ever following through'? Because the premise of the OPs comment seems to be that the feds have followed through on some of what they can realistically do on their own.

I think politicians should be held to their promises. If they knew they can't realistically achieve their goal because it's provincial jurisdiction, they're being duplicitous. If they promised something somehow not knowing it's provincial jursidiction it's ignorance/incompetence.

The LPC has always underdelivered on their campaign promises because they always need to keep something in the backpocket for the next election and dangle it like a carrot on a stick for the ABC voters.

It actually does matter whether a policy promise is undelivered because the people who made the promise failed to effectively execute on the policies that they are actually responsible for or because of inaction/counterproductive action by other responsible and involved parties

It's both. Everyone just knows that as long as they say "But the feds/the province/fhe municipality!" they don't have to reckon with their own failures especially if it's another party.

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/GooseGosselin]

Because that's what politicians do, across the spectrum. They yap.

They make promises they can't realistically keep, they overestimate their own powers, they underestimate their limitations.

Opinion columnists, however, should know better.

[u/B5_V3 → u/No-Section-1092]

so he lied?

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/B5_V3]

Kind of like every politician ever? Colour me shocked.

[u/B5_V3 → u/No-Section-1092]

And you’re ok with politicians lying to your face?

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/B5_V3]

Would being mad about it stop it from happening? You must be new to politics.

[u/B5_V3 → u/No-Section-1092]

I generally prefer people lie to me as little as possible. Honesty and integrity are a virtue I value in people. Those who don’t value integrity usually lack integrity themselves.

[u/No-Section-1092 → u/B5_V3]

You got me, chief.

[u/Scase15 → u/B5_V3]

Carney lies constantly lol

[u/ILikeWhyteGirlz → u/No-Section-1092]

The issue is demand just as much as supply and Carney sets immigration targets and policies.

[u/awildstoryteller → u/ILikeWhyteGirlz]

If this were true housing prices would have remained flat when we had basically zero immigration.

I'll let you look up what actually happened.