Last week, the Government released its highly anticipated Spring Economic Update. I, along with many across the country, tuned in with cautious optimism. What followed was a speech that felt deeply disconnected from the realities of life in Canada, one that had little to say to the millions of Canadians who are struggling to make ends meet. Promoted as a statement of economic vision for the nation, The Honourable François-Philippe Champagne took the stage, and what a stage it was.
Today, affordability feels like a distant memory for some, and a dream never realized for many. Living paycheck to paycheck, families and individuals continue to be inundated by skyrocketing costs on every front, including food, fuel, child care, rising rents and housing costs. As the pressure becomes too great, people fall into homelessness, a crisis that is no longer confined to the most marginalized. It is pulling in seniors, youth, the working class and middle-class families.
We have reached the point where it’s not that incomes have failed to keep up with the cost of living, because that framing implies a temporary mismatch between the two. The reality is that wages and the cost of living have fundamentally diverged into entirely different economic trajectories. This is the backdrop against which I, and I suspect many others, tuned into the Spring Economic Update. Which is why I was disheartened watching the chamber fill with laughter and applause while people are struggling to fill their tanks to get to work, and yet, the Minister confidently assured us that because of this government’s efforts, affordability has improved, a conclusion that is difficult to reconcile with the reality most Canadians are living.
This disconnect, however, is not new. There has long been a gap between government investments and outcomes, whereby substantial public investments are made, yet the benefits fail to reach those experiencing the greatest barriers to affordability. This is a pattern that makes it difficult not to receive the Minister’s announcement with cautious skepticism. Still, the Minister received thunderous applause while announcing a series of federal investments including: a groceries and essential benefit that 12 million Canadians are set to receive on June 5; the new Canada Strong Fund, Canada’s first-ever national savings and investment account designed to grow wealth for future generations; and $755 million — the largest investment in Canada’s sport system in 20 years — toward building, in the Minister’s words, “a Canada where sport is accessible for everyone”.
Yet, nowhere in the update was there a commitment to a Canada where housing is affordable and accessible to everyone. Instead, the housing file was addressed primarily through Build Canada Homes, which included a suite of measures focused on increasing supply, reducing red tape, supporting construction innovation, and, as the Minister put it, “extending help to people experiencing homelessness.” Help, notably, not housing.
As a young Canadian and a second-generation immigrant, I find myself asking questions that the Minister didn’t answer. How will these investments keep rents affordable for my friends living in the GTA? How will they ensure that my parents and elderly family members can afford to live with dignity as they enter retirement? And how will they help the many people living unsheltered in my city access not just help, but permanent, affordable, adequate housing?
Investments without clear targets or accountability measures are just numbers on a page. They tell us what the government is spending, but not what it is trying to achieve, or how it will know if it has succeeded. The update laid out ‘the what’. The missing element, however, and what people across the country deserve to know, is ‘the how’: a clear, measurable plan to achieve outcomes that people can actually feel in their daily lives.
On Tuesday, April 28, at 4:00 pm ET, I watched a theatrical production called the Spring Economic Update. It was well-rehearsed, warmly received, and largely disconnected from the lives of the people it was meant to serve. The cast was enthusiastic, the applause generous, and the status quo, by all accounts, intact. I’ll be back for the sequel, though I’m hoping for a different ending.
