Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The other day I asked the Minister of Housing how many houses we built in the last fiscal cycle. He said it was 38, so if you average that across the 33 communities, that’s 1.15 house per community. Of course, we all know that we don’t build 0.15 of a house, that’s just the way it averages.
Maybe for the public’s health and, certainly, clarification, how many new housing starts, as in new houses, not replacements, new houses will be available and provided by the Housing Corporation going into this next cycle? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister of Housing, Mr. McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Member is correct; most of the units we do put up are replacement units. We do have I believe it’s 30 market housing units that are going up this year. But as far as the stock goes, the Member is correct; the units we do put in are replacement units for old public housing units. Thank you.
I want to thank the Minister for that direct and clear answer. My math now tells me we’re doing, or sorry, the government is proposing into the next fiscal cycle to build 0.91 houses on average across the 33 communities. If you are one of those communities who is lucky to get one of those houses, or if it’s two or three of them, you are very fortunate.
I want to ask the Minister, as the Minister of Housing, what is he doing to increase the new housing portfolio, increase our stock of public housing, increase our ability to provide the affordability housing measure? At this rate, we are not meeting the demand. If we are not meeting the demand, we continue to put good families at serious risk. I want to hear how the Minister is fighting to increase the new start of new assets in the portfolio, because I have yet to see it and we are not keeping up with existing demand. Thank you.
What this Minister is doing is working with Social Programs committee and getting some feedback from them. This Minister is providing direction and leadership to the NWT Housing Corporation as to how we can distribute our resources equally across the Northwest Territories, and also trying to work with the federal government to ask them about our CMHC declining funding because that’s affecting our ability to put new houses on the ground. We are fortunate that this Assembly stepped up to the plate during the last O and M budget and gave Housing an additional $1.2 million to replace some of the money that we are losing from CMHC.
We continue to try to be innovative, try to get as many units on the ground as possible. I’m just trying to pull up the exact numbers and I should have them here shortly. Thank you.
The complaining about the federal funding, the CMHC declining funding, is an old song and an old dance. I have been a Member for 11 years and I hear about the same story every year, woe is me, declining funding. We have not come up with a new formula, rather than standing here with empty hands going, Ottawa, please give me more.
What new initiatives is this Minister leading to ensure that we get new houses built? Is he working with the private sector? Can he prove that this is actually happening? Frankly, we have seen, on average, no wave of new building and we cannot keep up with the existing demand. What is he doing? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, I’m not sure if the Member and I are living in the same territory because I know from the work that we’re doing, we’re getting as many units on the ground as possible. We used the Affordable Housing Initiative a few years ago to get a number of houses on the ground; we’ve converted them to public housing. We are trying to be as innovative as possible, recognizing the fact that we are losing funding. The Member says he has been a Member for 11 years and that has been the complaint for the last 11 years, and it will be the complaint until 2038 when we’re down to zero. So we have to continue to find ways to be sustainable, get houses on the ground, and we have a number of units that are going on the ground. Again, we continue to update Social Programs and get their feedback. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. McLeod. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The last comment was nothing more than just a shot at me, which I’m fine with, and a promo ad by the Minister. Mr. Speaker, we can’t continue to blame others. In this fiscal cycle we are only going to build less than one unit per community. He has not said one thing about trying to get new units in above the rate we are providing when we’re provided money by CMHC. He’s not telling us how he’s fought with Cabinet to get more money. He has not told us how he’s engaged private sector investment in communities that have no market. I’m not hearing anything innovative. I’m hearing the same old same old.
Would the Minister start talking about something new and useful rather than us sitting here and listening, we’re going to do less than one unit per community. It doesn’t keep pace with family growth, community growth. Mr. Speaker, we will never get on top of this problem under this style of leadership. We need something new.
I think we will get somewhere under this leadership this Assembly. I think we’ve proven that we’ve gotten somewhere. If the Member would have attended some of the Social Programs briefings, he would have been up to date on some of the initiatives that we’re taking and will continue to take them.
It is a struggle to work with Canada on the funding, but we’re not using that as an excuse, we’re trying to meet that head on. We’ve updated Social Programs on some of the initiatives that we’re taking to deal with the declining funding to go to a multi-unit type configuration. We find that would be able to stretch our dollars out a bit more and, also, they’re a lot easier to maintain, cheaper to maintain.
I’m going to get the numbers and I’m going to confirm the numbers, because our investments are strategic. If a community needs more units, then we will distribute some of the resources to that particular community. We have some communities that are fine with their allocation. So, we’ve continued to distribute our resources equally, Mr. Speaker. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister McLeod. Mr. Yakeleya.
