Singh commits to lowering rent for everyone by building more homes students can afford

The cost of a one-bedroom apartment in Halifax is over $1,863 a month—that’s a 9.3 per cent increase from last year.

HALIFAX – On Monday, Canada’s NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was in Halifax meeting with university students about the lack of affordable housing in their city. Under the Trudeau government, the vacancy rate in Halifax is at one per cent making it difficult for young people to find an affordable place to live.

Singh is calling for more affordable housing to be built by establishing a federal, cost-share initiative with the provinces and territories, a financial incentive to turn existing, empty office spaces into affordable housing, and linking the allocation of study permits to institutions that prove they have affordable housing options.

“Every student deserves a place to live that they can afford while completing their studies. But as many students head back to school in the next few days, one of the biggest issues on their minds isn’t preparing for another school year –it’s how they’re going to afford a place to live,” said Singh. “Under Justin Trudeau and Andy Filmore, rent is at a record high. While students scramble to keep up, help from the Trudeau government is nowhere to be found. Under the Liberals, the housing crisis has gotten steadily worse and students are paying the price."

While Pierre Poilievre says he’d do things differently, during his nine years in government, 800,000 homes people could afford were lost. That number rose by an additional 200,000 units under Justin Trudeau which means there’s a million families that could have had an affordable place to live today.

“We are in this crisis because Conservatives and Liberals stopped building homes people can afford. They let big money investors and corporate landlords take over the housing market – driving up prices for everyone else so they could make a quick buck.

Justin Trudeau is out-of-touch with what people are facing and acting like everything is fine while renters just keep paying more and more. And Pierre Poilievre is not who he pretends to be; he’d make life even harder for students. When he had the chance to build homes people could afford – he failed.

The federal government has the resources, the land and the power to build more affordable housing units in cities across the country. They just need the will to do it,” added Singh.