QUEEN’S PARK — MPP for Guelph Mike Schreiner released the following statement in response to a new report showing that the wage needed to afford a one-bedroom apartment in Ontario is $25.96 an hour.
“Ontario’s housing crisis is at boiling point, and we can’t afford to wait to take action. People need help now.
Rents have become totally unaffordable for most people. We’re seeing nurses and teachers struggling to afford a place to live in their own communities, let alone minimum-wage workers and people locked into legislative poverty on social assistance.
With no affordable options to be found, what are Ontarians supposed to do?
I call on the government to step up and deliver the bold solutions we need to solve the housing affordability crisis:
- Renew 260,000 community housing rental homes over the next decade, in partnership with the federal government, under the National Housing Strategy;
- Build 182,000 new permanently affordable community housing rental homes over the next decade;
- Mandate inclusionary zoning and require a minimum of 20 per cent affordable units in all housing projects above a certain size;
- Provide nonprofit housing providers the support and access to capital needed to purchase rental buildings to maintain affordability in perpetuity;
- Partner with nonprofits, co-ops, and community land trusts to use public land for permanently affordable rental housing and attainable home ownership options through low-cost long-term leases;
- Reinstate rent controls on all units to regulate rental increases year-to-year and implement vacancy control to limit rent increases between tenancies;
- Establish a clear system for above-guideline rent increases that governs which renovations are necessary and can qualify for an increase in rent;
- And more than double social assistance rates so people with disabilities don’t have to choose between buying groceries and paying rent.”