Poilievre promises to cut municipal housing taxes in bid to boost home building

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is campaigning in the vote-rich GTA Thursday, promising Canadians policies that will cut taxes to make homes more affordable.

Speaking in Milton, Ont. Poilievre unveiled another plank of his party's plan to tame the housing crisis by pledging to cut development taxes on new home construction. 

For every dollar of development taxes cut, a newly elected Conservative government says it will match that amount to a maximum of $25,000 per home, for a total possible saving of $50,000. 

For example, if a municipality cuts development taxes on a home by $35,000, it will receive a "federal bonus" of $17,500. 

"We will build more, tax less and get the government out of the way to save you tens of thousands of dollars," Poilievre said in a video promoting the policy. 

The Conservative campaign says the cost of the policy would total $1.56 billion per year. 

The Conservatives previously announced that their housing plan will also require "municipalities to speed up permits and free up land to allow 15 per cent more home building per year," in order to get infrastructure money from the federal government. 

A city that only increases the number of homes built by 10 per cent in a given year would see five per cent of its federal infrastructure funding withheld or clawed back.

Carney defends his housing plan

Another plank of the Conservative housing plan that was announced March 25 is their pledge to remove the GST from the purchase of new homes valued at up to $1.3 million. 

The party said cutting that tax would save a homebuyer a maximum of about $65,000 on the purchase of a new home. People only pay GST on new or substantially renovated homes.

The Conservatives say the GST measure will cost between $3.96 billion and $4.97 billion, and will be partially paid for with the $2.52 billion in extra revenue they expect from the economic spinoffs of building 36,000 extra homes each year. The rest of the GST cut will be paid for by cutting bureaucracy. 

Carney unveiled his party's housing plan on March 31, promising to double the number of homes built annually in Canada to nearly 500,000.

To get there, Carney said he would create an entity called Build Canada Homes (BCH) — a "lean, mission-driven organization" that would provide tens of billions in financing for affordable housing projects.

BCH will supply $25 billion in debt financing and $1 billion in equity financing to "innovative Canadian prefabricated home builders."

A Liberal Party backgrounder explained that BCH will also issue bulk orders of housing units from Canadian modular and prefabricated home builders in order "to create sustained demand."

BCH will also provide $10 billion in low-cost financing and grants that it will then funnel into different affordable home building streams. 

Carney defended his housing plan Thursday during a campaign stop in Brampton, Ont., where he was unveiling his crime policy, saying he has announced the most "comprehensive and ambitious" housing strategy since the Second World War. 

"This is emblematic of my government. We're focused on results, we're focused on these core issues," Carney said.  

The Liberal leader said he will approach his housing initiative by setting clear objectives, tracking progress on a monthly basis and holding people to account.

A mix of grants and loans to the tune of $4 billion will be directed into long-term, fixed-rate financing for affordable homes. 

The other $6 billion in grants will be earmarked for quickly building "deeply affordable housing, supportive housing, Indigenous housing and shelters."

About $2 billion of that $6 billion in "deeply affordable" housing money will be used to help build housing for students and seniors, in partnership with the provinces and territories.