Cabinet must address “housing injustice” with new laws and policies, says the Federal Housing Advocate. Marie-Josée Houle in a report to Parliament faulted current programs as a “sorry disappointment.”

“There has been housing injustice in Canada,” Houle wrote in her first Annual Report. The Advocate complained of seeing tent cities in city parks surrounded by urban wealth.

“In Vancouver the disparity was staggering,” wrote Houle. “The tent encampment where people are living in Crab Park was silhouetted against a luxury cruise ship in the distance. In Montréal I visited a 24-hour shelter space that serves unhoused and precariously housed people each day which is located not far from a sparkling new luxury condo building.”