Mr. Prime Minister François Legault, if we are speaking to you today, it is not out of despair, but nourished by the hope that you can turn the housing situation around in Quebec. You are aware that tens, even hundreds of thousands of Quebecers are today poorly housed, in overly expensive, often unsanitary housing, or live with the permanent fear of ending up on the street. These situations are terribly stressful and endanger the right to housing, which has become cruelly precarious.
The housing crisis is no longer in doubt. The most visible impacts are alarming: dizzying increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness throughout Quebec, explosion in the use of food banks, inability of the community and health sector to respond to the explosion in demands.
However, certain impacts of this crisis are also alarming, although less visible. We know that housing is one of the most important determinants of good mental health. So, when it is no longer possible to live in health and safety in a stable home, mental health disorders multiply and destroy lives. It’s not just food banks and last resort shelters that are bursting at the seams; health professionals have recently sounded the alarm about the increase in distress linked to housing, a very worrying phenomenon which is congesting CLSCs, emergency rooms and psychiatric wings of hospitals.
In alternative mental health resources, we are also increasingly seeing that people, already made vulnerable by difficult life paths and heavy prejudices, experience constant stress related to housing. A Montreal psychiatrist recently confided that the main stressor identified by people hospitalized in psychiatry was, unsurprisingly, housing.
A large proportion of tenants lose their homes in a completely unfair manner, victims of merciless speculation which ultimately only benefits a small segment of the population. Other tenants are having difficulty paying rents that have become far too expensive, following excessive and repetitive increases. Many have no choice but to live in slums or motels. No matter the crisis situation, the result is the same: the thread of life is broken. There is even talk of taking action among certain people who have already been weakened by a series of ordeals.
The path is now short to the street, but it is long and arduous to get out. We know that you pay particular attention to the costs of social programs affecting taxpayers. However, in addition to being infinitely costly on a human and social level, the worsening of homelessness situations is also very costly for the Quebec state. Appropriate legislative measures and adequate funding for social housing programs can significantly reduce the costs associated with the resources and care required for people finding themselves on the street.
It is therefore more than justified to urgently implement the measures we are proposing, namely:
- a moratorium on evictions for expansion, subdivision and change of use, which have become purely speculative operations;
- compulsory control and monitoring of all housing takeover projects and evacuations for major works which, for the moment, are evicting a number of tenants without any authority verifying whether the projects are legitimate and carried out;
- compulsory rent control measures, in particular a rent cap and a rent register, to prevent rent increases exceeding inflation;
- a significant and lasting increase in social and community housing programs to meet pressing needs that the private market cannot meet, in particular by launching the construction of 50,000 new social and community housing units over the next five years.
These measures are not new. Where they are in force, they have demonstrated their power to contribute to the well-being of tenants, while allowing the private market to develop without generating all the damage that can be observed. They represent a powerful lever for acting on mental health. Housing is recognized as an important determinant of this: our invitation to intervene on the housing crisis is therefore also an invitation to realize the right to health and mental health for all. It is urgent to take action.
In the hope that you will hear this cry for help and this urgency.
*The list of all co-signers is here.