Conservative MPs believed in housing fund, criticised by their leader

Photo: Valérian Mazataud Le Devoir The Housing Acceleration Fund invites cities to request a sum of money based on the ambition of their housing construction plans.

Nojoud Al Mallees – The Canadian Press in Ottawa

Published at 12:24 p.m.

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Five Conservative MPs have already written to the Liberal housing minister asking him to provide municipalities in their ridings with funding from a program that Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre called disastrous this week — and has promised to scrap.

Housing Minister Sean Fraser made the revelation in the House on Tuesday, responding to a question from Poilievre.

“What [Poilievre] doesn't know is that his caucus colleagues have been writing to me, behind closed doors, asking for funding from the Housing Acceleration Fund for their communities because they believe it will help build more housing,” Fraser said in the House.

“My question to the Conservative MPs in his caucus: Will they have the courage to stand up and tell him he's wrong?”

Fraser said Wednesday that at least a dozen Conservative MPs have written to his office.

The Canadian Press has seen five letters sent between September 2023 and February 2024 by Dan Albas, Michael Cooper, Adam Chambers, Lianne Rood and Rob Moore. The MPs represent ridings in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and New Brunswick.

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Conservative MPs have all called on Minister Fraser to approve applications from municipalities in their ridings to take advantage of the Housing Acceleration Fund, a program that invites cities to apply for a sum of money based on the ambition of their housing construction plans. Poilievre has been critical of the fund since the Liberal government began signing agreements with municipalities.

The Conservative leader also announced Monday that he would eliminate the program and use his budgets to fund his plan to eliminate the federal sales tax on new homes under $1 million. He called the fund “a disastrous program that has led to less housing construction and more local bureaucracy.”

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But Conservative MPs who wrote to Minister Fraser to support local applications believed the program would help their communities build more housing. Rob Moore, the MP for Fundy Royal, N.B., vouched in January for Butternut Valley's bid, which he said “will provide much-needed housing to this area.”

In a statement to The Canadian Press, Poilievre’s spokesman Sebastian Skamski said the Conservative plan to eliminate the GST on new homes under $1 million “would create 30,000 more homes per year,” reduce purchase prices by up to $50,000 and cut mortgage payments by nearly $3,000 per year.

“Unlike their multi-billion dollar so-called ‘housing accelerator’ fund that is essentially a photo op, this common-sense policy benefits all Canadians without bureaucratic demands or expensive photo ops designed for Liberal political gain,” Skamski wrote, not addressing the letters sent by Conservative MPs.

The Liberal government first announced the $4-billion program in the spring 2022 federal budget and supplemented it with an additional $400 million in the most recent budget. The government says it has reached 177 agreements with municipalities through the Housing Acceleration Fund and a separate agreement with the Quebec government.

Minister Fraser’s office says the municipal applications supported by the five Conservative MPs have yet to receive funding, but the program still has a $400-million envelope.