The Legault government has taken too long to recognize the housing crisis and must imperatively and immediately take stock of the situation and prepare a plan to end the crisis.
In a rare joint outing, players from the construction sector, real estate, the community sector and elected municipal officials issued the following cry of alarm on Wednesday in Montreal: if the situation is not taken in hand starting now in a multi-sector way, the crisis will worsen in July 2024, in 2025 and in 2026.
Everyone agrees that the crisis is attributable to an insufficient supply of housing and that this situation will worsen since a drop in the number of housing starts is expected, whereas they should be multiplied by three to relieve the market. The President and Executive Director of Centraide of Greater Montreal, Claude Pinard, thus deplored the lack of construction of social and affordable housing, pointing the finger at condo buildings in the process of being erected which cannot, in any case, represent a remains potential for a single mother with a modest salary.
The actors gathered, signatories of an open letter on this subject published on Wednesday, say they want to participate with the Legault government in the implementation of solutions, but did not want to advance on one issue or another at a press conference. , fearing that an idea will be taken up to the detriment of a global plan which must involve many ministries and a multiplicity of measures.
For them, all the measures put forward so far attack the problem piecemeal, which will not resolve the crisis in the medium or long term. They argue in their open letter that “housing is an issue that also concerns infrastructure, transportation, the economy, health, immigration, seniors and homelessness” and that this complexity “calls for an approach transversal” involving several ministries and other actors in society.