BC Conservatives vs New Democratic Party Housing Policies

With the provincial election coming up, housing is a key issue on both the New Democratic Party (NDP) and BC Conservatives platforms. Both parties recognize that housing affordability in British Columbia is a big challenge for Canadians, which continues to dominate news  headlines. The NDP have had seven years in power trying to fix an issue plaguing British Columbians for decades with new policy and bureaucracy. The BC Conservatives feel the opposite is needed and by reducing red tape and government interference the markets driven by the private sector will balance our housing needs. We’ve taken three major issues on housing to duke out both sides’ approaches and see if we have a winner on fixing the housing crisis.

Round 1: Housing Supply

 
BC Conservatives
  • Rely more on certified professionals and less on staff at city hall
  • Streamline the permitting process with better technology and communication within the different departments
  • Keep autonomy with the local governments retaining much of the status quo

 

NDP
  • Centralize land use decisions to the provincial government to ensure housing targets are met (Bill 47)
  • Use taxpayer dollars to Increase government presence in the owning, building, and operating of rental housing construction through the Rental Protection Fund

 

The BC Conservatives have a contradictory approach to increasing the housing supply. They want to standardize the permitting process to increase speed and deliver housing faster, but keep the status quo of empowering local governments to make decisions related to zoning and land use. The Canadian Mortgage Housing Corp (CMHC) reported BC needs 570,000 more homes by 2030, double what is currently being approved by municipal governments and built.

The BC NDP want to reduce local governments control over housing as they feel they are too close to the individual interests of the community. However, the NDP also wants to increase government participation in the owning, building and operating of housing. According to Business in Vancouver tax payers are spending up to $500,000 per person on shelter when the private sector is delivering similar housing at $110,000 per person 

 

Winner: No One

Round 2: Affordability Initiatives 

 
Conservatives
  • Reduce government intervention and let the market forces of the private sector build to increase the overall supply of housing and bring down the cost
  • Remove or reduce taxes and regulation that reduce investment and incentive to build housing, such as removing Property Transfer Tax on primary residences

 

NDP
  • Increase management on housing through rental assistance programs, add more subsidies for low-income tenants, and increase regulations on rent controls.
  • Increase and add taxes like the speculation, vacancy, foreign buyers tax, property purchase tax, flipping tax, and additional school tax to discourage real estate speculation and investment to lower the demand for housing.
  • Encourage social and affordable housing

 

Increasing the supply of anything is well documented and supported by Economists to lower the market price, while decreasing demand doesn’t work when everyone needs a place to live. By incentivizing developers to build and removing taxes to encourage people to buy will result in more housing with better affordability.

While some affordable housing may be needed, the cost is prohibitive with the current misconception of expecting social housing rent. See my article The Affordability Scam for more information. As an example in Burnaby, for every affordable housing unit required a developer must build 2 additional units to break even in woodframe developments, which goes up to 3:1 in concrete developments. The result is only 1 project has actually been completed since the policy was mandated in 2018 that required the help of subsidized funding by taxpayers in a city that was booming with development prior to the new policy.

Winner: Conservatives

Round 2: Building Regulations

 
Conservatives
  • Streamlining building regulations to speed up the approval process for new developments.

 

NDP
  • Mandate higher standards for green and energy efficiency in new developments
  • Add building code requirements like making all units handicap accessible
  • Exploring the safety of removing a staircase allows for more unique and efficient building designs.

 

Winner: Conservatives

Summary

 

The Conservatives plan is to let the private sector due what they do best, build. They want to remove red tape and taxes to reduce friction for developers to build while improving technology to streamline the permitting process. However, the Conservatives wanting to keep the status quo of local government autonomy has been a major factor in the lack of supply from municipalities reacting to individual interests. The NDP want a more centralized approach adding government intervention, taxes, and control over how housing gets built to try and coordinate the right type of housing that they think will bring down housing costs for the average british columbian. After seven years of housing affordability getting worse we know adding taxes and more bureaucracy isn’t working, so both parties’ solutions are flawed.

 

The Solution

 

If we combine the new framework of centralizing land use updates and housing targets with reducing red tape, taxes, reversing burdensome building code requirements, and improving technology to reduce friction in the permitting process we could potentially see one of the most effective approval rates in the country. Collectively we have a path forward to improve the housing environment, now we just need the collaboration to execute on it.

 

 
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