The week of the 1ster July is becoming increasingly heavy, sad, and loaded as we count the uprooted lives. The toll grows darker each time we cross the line: more and more homeless, poorly housed. More than 1,600 households without housing, said the Popular Action Front for Urban Redevelopment (FRAPRU) on Thursday — an increase compared to previous years, even though the total number of moves on 1er July tends to decrease. Movers report this on the ground: people are moving less, but when they do, it is most often because they had no choice…
The Regroupement des comités logement et associations de locataires du Québec has published the findings of its Kijiji classified ads survey, which paints a picture of the real cost of available housing in Quebec’s major cities. The title of the report says it all: Moving: A nightmare for tenants, a dream opportunity for landlordsThe findings are overwhelming: between 2020 and 2024, the price of available housing jumped by 27% in Montreal, 33% in Quebec City, and 37% in Saguenay. In Trois-Rivières, the increase reached 50% — Rimouski and Sherbrooke are close, with 49% and 44%, respectively.
While the cost of living has increased overall, it has grown significantly less quickly than rents. Unsurprisingly, evictions are also on the rise: 132% compared to last year, according to what is reported by housing committees. This “rotation” induces a spiral of increasing rents since landlords take advantage of it to implement a rent increase that is greater than the rate suggested by the Administrative Housing Tribunal.
As for the big winners of the housing crisis, here too, the results are clear: they are those who make a career out of investing in real estate. As the Institute for Socioeconomic Research and Information indicated in a study published in June, the profitability of investments in residential real estate is holding up — which does not prevent investors from preferring the construction of lucrative properties to affordable, social or private housing. The idea that we are struggling to meet the demand for housing because it has become ruinous to build buildings is misleading. In reality, we are building without regard to people’s housing needs.
Bill 31 by Minister France-Élaine Duranceau has also given impetus to this type of construction, under the pretext of stimulating construction starts. An amendment inserted at the last minute now allows municipalities to deviate from their urban planning regulations to promote the construction of housing units. What type? It is not specified.
The net result of these policy directions is visible here and now. The housing crisis is putting pressure on all vulnerable groups. Low-income renter families, first and foremost. But also women who find themselves in a situation of violence, people living with a mental health disorder, seniors who are unaware of their rights. In the last few days, a quote struck me. In an interview with Dutythe general director of the Tangente shelter, stressed that, in these times, “no one is leaving homelessness, there are only people entering it.”
Here we are facing a “perfect storm” that we have aggravated, fueled, by this negligence. Contrary to what the Legault government claims, it is not “immigration” that precipitated this crisis, but rather decades of housing policies focused on the commodification and profitability of housing. Immigrants, especially asylum seekers, are the first to suffer the ravages of the housing crisis: high rents, unsanitary housing, overcrowding. As for the famous “temporary workers”, who are supposedly responsible for all the problems, they are often housed by their employer, which, in concrete terms, does not put pressure on the rental market. If we closed the door to all immigrants tomorrow morning, we would still be stuck with the same problem.
A letter published in The duty addressed to Minister Duranceau spoke of Lucien, a man found dead in the kitchen of the apartment he had occupied for 52 years, in front of an eviction notice. His neighbor Janie Boucher wrote: “You can’t make it up, Madame Duranceau: his heart stopped beating in the face of an implacable destiny of struggle, or uprooting.” One can die of a broken heart. One can also die of wear and tear.
This recalls the cruel story of Clément Robitaille, a man evicted from his apartment in the winter of 2021, in the middle of a pandemic, and found dead in July 2022 in his vehicle, which had become his home. Journalists revealed that the man had been pressured by the owners—shareholders of a numbered company—to leave his apartment on Bélanger Street in Montreal. He ended up giving in, for $2,500 and moving costs. There was no way to find new housing.
Without even talking about public policies, I wonder how we can live with ourselves when we earn our living by breaking the lives of others, when we make a career of selfishness and extortion. I wonder what we think about at the end of a life lived like that, when we leave behind so much ugliness, hidden behind money and shiny possessions. Do we die happy? What do we tell our children? Do we make up for it by doing charity, by running marathons for sick children?
Perhaps there is something of this in the current housing drama. Public policies are based on such dehumanization. When housing becomes a commodity, people become negligible quantities. It is urgent to reverse this trend.