(Saint-Hyacinthe) The Minister of Housing, France-Élaine Duranceau, engaged in real estate speculation by transforming a duplex in Montreal into condos, deplores Québec solidaire, which believes that this shows that it has no not the tenants interest at heart.
What there is to know
- Housing Minister France-Élaine Duranceau, along with other partners, renovated a duplex on Avenue de Chateaubriand acquired at a cost of $517,000 to fit out five condominium units, before reselling them for a total over 3 million.
- This “speculative” practice is denounced by Québec solidaire.
- Andrés Fontecilla would rather frame the “flips”, which increase the cost of real estate and housing.
“She did a real estate flip. It is not prohibited, but it is a speculative practice which contributes powerfully to price increases. She bought a building with apartments, and took them off the rental market, and sold them as condos. It comes to put pressure on the price of rents, ”denounced the deputy of Quebec solidaire Andrés Fontecilla.
France-Élaine Duranceau and Annie Lemieux, president of the LS4 real estate group, have indeed joined forces to carry out a purchase-resale operation – a completely legal real estate “flip” – in La Petite-Patrie in Montreal.
With other partners, they renovated a duplex on Avenue de Chateaubriand acquired at a cost of $517,000 to fit out five condominiums, before reselling them for more than 3 million in total. The last of these condos was sold on November 29, 2022, according to the Land Registry, while Mme Duranceau was Minister of Housing.
” We consider [que les flips] contribute to soaring prices and make it more difficult to access property,” said Mr. Fontecilla, who met Friday in Saint-Hyacinthe with his colleagues as part of the National Council of Québec solidaire, which is to continue this Saturday and Sunday. Instead, he wants to regulate this practice with a bill.
Promote the interests of owners
He believes that M.me Duranceau contributed to the housing crisis with his behavior. “Obviously, it’s not a single person who is creating the crisis, but he is part of this movement of speculators who come to eat away at the rental market,” he said.
Despite everything, Québec solidaire co-spokesperson Manon Massé is ready to give Mr.me Duranceau, if she modifies her bill.
She has the opportunity to show us that she is a minister who will take care of the forty percent of her fellow citizens who are tenants and that she will not allow herself to be influenced solely by the environment from which she comes. We give her a chance, but she has to line up.
Manon Massé, co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire
This national council is the last where Mme Massé will be co-spokesperson. The race to replace her has not officially started, but already three candidates are actively campaigning and have sharply criticized Mme Duranceau.
Race
Christine Labrie (“it’s dripping with contempt”), Ruba Ghazal (“it’s not the interests of the tenants that she has at heart, but the interests of the owners”) and Émilise Lessard-Therrien (“finally , our politicians are close to the elite, all the time”) all attacked the Minister of Housing.
They also put forward arguments to obtain the votes of the delegates of Québec solidaire who will choose, next November, the one who will succeed Manon Massé.
The member for Mercier, Ruba Ghazal, wants to talk about independence and “more progressive and inclusive left-wing nationalism”, a speech that the population does not currently hear from Québec solidaire.
I know that people in the regions are sensitive to this more nationalist discourse and I want to put that more forward.
Ruba Ghazal, MP for Mercier
The former MP for Rouyn-Noranda–Témiscamingue, Émilise Lessard-Therrien, defeated in the 2022 general election, argued that the fact that she comes from a region would allow her to seek the ear of the rural Quebec, and that she would have time to do so since she is not elected. “For me, that’s a big advantage. QS has always claimed to be the party of the ballot box and the street. To embody the street well, it takes an extra-parliamentary spokesperson who will be there to invest the ground, who will be close to social groups, ”she said.
For her part, Sherbrooke MNA Christine Labrie replied that she had managed to keep her seat. “I demonstrated in 2018 and 2022 that I am capable of not only making Québec solidaire break through in a region where there was not already solid support, but also of maintaining this support. I am able to reach people who were not interested in Québec solidaire before, or who were not interested in politics at all,” she said.
Difficult week for Duranceau
The Minister of Housing has not had an easy week. His Bill 31, introduced on the last day of the parliamentary session a week ago, was poorly received by tenant advocacy groups.
The bill is a “big gift” to landlords by limiting lease assignments, denounced QS and the Parti Québécois.
Mme Duranceau had also had to correct comments she had made last week to defend her bill.
“You can’t use a right that isn’t yours, to assign a lease to someone else, on terms you decide when it’s not your building. The tenant who wants to do that, he has to invest in real estate, ”she said in an interview with Noovo, last Friday.
“I said that and I’m sorry if it seemed insensitive, I was in a legal and economic description of things. On the contrary, I am very sensitive to what is happening in terms of housing, ”she pleaded on her arrival at the Council of Ministers.
With the collaboration of Hugo Joncas and Charles-Éric Blais-Poulin, The Press