Ontario Premier Doug Ford said Thursday he is aware that housing is increasingly unaffordable for many people and reiterated that his government is addressing the problem by working to make it easier to approve new developments.
Speaking with reporters at a news conference in Toronto Thursday, Ford was asked what his government will do given that the average cost of a detached home in Toronto is close to $2 million.
“We’re going to make sure that when applications go in, that they get approved as quickly as possible,” Ford said, while promising that those working on the applications will still have to “cross their t's and dot their i's.”
“That's what we need to do. There's a lot of tools that the province can always help the municipalities out as well and we'll give them every tool possible to make us a lot quicker when it comes to getting housing starts.”
Data released Thursday by the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB), which represents Toronto-area realtors, also show that the average home price in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) has gone up nearly 28 per cent compared to last year.
Ford acknowledged that while housing used to be considered expensive in Toronto proper, prices have risen drastically across the GTA in recent years.
“At one time it used to be just Toronto and the GTA. Now it doesn't matter if you go up north,” Ford said.
He pointed out that the province had its highest number of housing starts in more than 30 years last year.
Data from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, which tracks housing starts in Canada, show that the province had 100,089 starts in 2021. That’s the highest number since 1989 when Ontario saw 93,337 starts.
But he said more must still be done to make it easier to approve new housing projects.
“We have to cut the red tape and all the bureaucracy,” Ford said. “We're working collaboratively with all the municipalities, and I thought we had a really good meeting – I know Mayor Tory was there as well -- all of us want to make sure that there's affordable housing right across the province.”
While housing is in high demand, there have been concerns in recent years over the province’s use of ministerial zoning orders which allow developers to bypass local planning process in order to fast-track projects.
Ford’s comments about working collaboratively with municipalities follow a statement last week from Ontario’s Big City Mayors (OBCM) committing to working with the provincial government and Ontario Housing Minister Steve Clark to “develop solutions to address the ongoing housing affordability challenges faced by Ontarians.”
“OBCM encourages the provincial government to take into account the appropriate role of local governments in building their communities as they finalize plans to encourage more housing,” the mayors said in their statement. “Together, through hard work and collaboration, we can build a land use planning process and invest in housing supports that create more housing options for Ontarians.”
The group said they would have a more detailed response to the province about how to do that shortly.
Last month the government unveiled its Housing Affordability Task Force Report. Among other things, the report called for the province to aggressively build 1.5 million new homes over 10 years.
While low interest rates have partly been blamed for the steady upward march of home prices, experts said this week that a rate hike by the Bank of Canada is not likely to cool the market.
- With files from The Canadian Press
