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From the Toronto Star ...

UN housing envoy scolds Canadians -`Radical shift in policy' needed to tackle crisis, official warns after visit

Oct 23, 2007 - Bruce Campion-Smith

OTTAWA–An ambitious national housing program and a strategy to combat poverty is urgently needed to tackle the disaster-like conditions of homelessness and inadequate housing found across the country, a United Nations envoy says.

Miloon Kothari, the UN's special rapporteur on adequate housing, warned yesterday that Canadians are becoming complacent to the crisis unfolding on the streets and that public attitudes could soon mirror the indifference found in the United States.

"What is beginning here has already happened in the U.S., where you speak to people (and) they say, `the homeless are there by choice,' or `it's those drug addicts,'" Kothari said in an interview yesterday. "That is a very serious mental shift."

Kothari ended his two-week visit to Canada yesterday with harsh words for provincial and federal politicians, painting a dramatic picture of a crisis caused by governments' deep funding cuts in the mid-1990s to housing programs and social assistance that once helped impoverished Canadians afford a home.

The result is crowded homeless shelters, tenants living in substandard housing and aboriginal communities without safe drinking water.

"I am very disturbed by the housing situation in Canada," he told a news conference. "The national housing crisis ... needs national attention."

During his visit, he travelled to Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton and Montreal as well as aboriginal reserves. He visited shelters, talked to housing advocates and reviewed reports. And at the end of his visit yesterday, he questioned how a country like Canada, with its rich surpluses and history of progressive housing policies, had let the housing crisis get so out of hand.

"You have had a history of very progressive housing policies which were summarily abandoned in the mid-'90s, and the consequences of that are here tragically for all of us to see," he said.

"I hope there is a radical shift in government policy," Kothari said.

Coupled with the cuts to government housing programs, Kothari said an "astronomical rise" in house prices has placed rental and ownership housing out of reach for many.

NDP MP Bill Siksay (Burnaby-Douglas), who attended the briefing, said the federal government has stripped the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corp., a Crown corporation, of its mandate to tackle the affordable housing shortage.

Recommendations in Kothari's preliminary report include:

• Federal funding and programs for a comprehensive housing strategy, co-ordinated with the provinces. That includes extending Ottawa's affordable housing program, due to expire next year, by another 10 years.
   
• A large-scale initiative to build social housing units and more money to refurbish existing affordable housing.
   
• Special attention and funding to help people on the "margins," such as women, youth, seniors and aboriginals.
   
• A "comprehensive and properly funded" poverty-reduction strategy. "Grossly inadequate" social assistance programs have left many impoverished tenants unable to break the cycle of poverty, he said.

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AFNQL Press Release ...

The Harper Government is Blamed on the International Scene

WENDAKE, QC, Oct. 23 - The Chief of the Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador (AFNQL), Ghislain Picard, welcomes with satisfaction, the words of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Madam Louise Arbour, as well as those of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, Mr. Miloon Khotari, both condemning the Harper government on the way it treats the First Nations.

"The Canadian government has to face up to its responsibilities towards the First Nations. It's high time that our right to self-government be recognized, as well as the obligation to respect our treaties. Madam Arbour and Mr. Khotari confirm, once again, that the federal government does not honor its obligations towards the First Nations and that it is not an example of respect of human rights", states Mr. Picard.

Madam Arbour affirms that, on the international level, Canada is seen as an example of tolerance and diversity, and that its stance towards the United Nations Declaration on Indigenous Peoples, is very surprising and very disappointing.

As maintained by the AFNQL for many years now, there is a crisis in housing and Mr. Khotari is telling Canada to review its housing strategy towards the Aboriginal peoples. The Special Rapporteur, who just completed yesterday a two-week journey in Canada, states that the government must invest more funds and resources in order to attain adequate housing conditions for people living in and outside the communities.

Mr. Khotari is especially concerned by the devastating effects of paternalism that the federal government entertains towards the First Nations. Instead of contributing to improve the situation, the current legislations, policies and budgetary allocations have negative impacts.

To conclude, the AFNQL wishes to express its gratitude to Mr. Khotari for his presence in Canada and for his sympathetic ear during his visit.

The Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador is the regional organization which represents the Chiefs of the First Nations of Quebec and Labrador.

For further information: Alain Garon, Communications Officer, AFNQL, (418) 842-5020, Cellular: (418) 956-5720