Mark Carney has announced that a new Liberal government would build more homes that Canadians can afford, with Canada’s most ambitious housing plan since the Second World War.

During and after the Second World War, Canada was facing a massive housing crisis – similar to today’s. In response, the government of the day built tens of thousands of affordable starter homes for returning veterans and their families. Prime Minister William Lyon MacKenzie King’s policies created new agencies to oversee the construction of homes, built entirely new industries, and found ways to cut costs and cut the time to build.

Build Canada Homes

“In the face of President Trump’s tariffs, we need to build for Canadians,” says Mark Carney, leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. “We’re going to build homes Canadians can afford, and a new industry that can take on the world. We’re going to get the government back into the business of homebuilding, while partnering with workers and industry, and cutting taxes for homebuyers – so more Canadians can buy their first homes.”

Carney-led says a Liberal government will double the pace of construction to almost 500,000 new homes a year, with a housing plan that will:

• Create Build Canada Homes (BCH) to get the federal government back into the business of homebuilding, by:

- Acting as a developer to build affordable housing at scale, including on public lands;

- Providing $10 billion in low-cost financing and capital to affordable homebuilders.

• Make the housing market work better by catalyzing private capital, cutting red tape and lowering the cost of homebuilding:

- Cutting municipal development charges in half for multi-unit residential housing while working with provinces and territories to keep municipalities whole;

- Reintroducing a tax incentive which, when originally introduced in the 1970s, spurred tens of thousands of rental housing across the country;

- Facilitating the conversion of existing structures into affordable housing units; and

- Building on the success of the Housing Accelerator Fund, further reducing housing bureaucracy, zoning restrictions, and other red tape to have builders navigate one housing market, instead of thirteen.

These measures are in addition to the earlier announced elimination of the GST for first-time homebuyers on homes at or less than $1 million.

Welcomed news to industry

The Building Industry and Land Development Association (BILD) is among the industry groups applauding the measures.

“BILD welcomes Liberal leader Mark Carney’s housing platform commitments,” the association says. “If elected, he would cut municipal (development charges) in half for multi-residential housing and reintroduce the Municipal Unit Rental Building policy to spur rental housing developments. These are the reforms BILD has been advocating for, to address the housing crisis in the GTA.”