Ottawa, ON – Kitchener Centre MP Mike Morrice is specializing in addressing the housing crisis by removing tax exemptions for corporate investors through his proposed Private Members Motion (PMM) 71.
“Institutional investors should put money into the stock market, not in our housing supply,” said MP Mike Morrice. “We’d like to beat back on large corporate investors who’re taking on our neighbourhoods, leading to increased housing costs for each renters and homebuyers.”
Morrice’s Motion 71 asks the federal government to each end tax incentives for Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) and to take a position the resulting revenues in reasonably priced non-profit and co-operative housing.
“The housing crisis is hitting our community particularly hard, and the federal government has a major role to play in addressing it. With Motion 71, we’re offering them a critical solution that should be part of a bigger strategy: ensure corporate investors pay their fair proportion of taxes and direct the brand new revenue to reasonably priced housing.”
Social Development Centre Waterloo Region (SDCWR) has been conducting research with University of Waterloo Professor Brian Doucet’s team on gentrification and displacement in each the urban core and inner suburbs of Kitchener-Waterloo that demonstrates the community continues to lose more cost-effective units every yr than it’s capable of construct or plan for.
“Practices adopted by financialized landlords to maneuver people out are uprooting and pushing residents out of their homes, neighbourhoods, and communities. The reasonably priced buildings are being replaced with the indiscriminate construction of high-priced high-rise condominiums mostly as investments rented out, not lived in,” said Aleksandra Petrovic, Executive Director of SDCWR. “Our research demonstrates the continued devastating impact of the practices of investment corporations through evictions for renovations or developments, upscaling of reasonably priced rental properties, on top of the crumbling infrastructure created as a result of negligence, lack of maintenance and safety, savings on mandatory repairs, decent pay or training for workers.”
Matt Clark of Waterloo Region Yes In My BackYard (WR YIMBY) says members of their advocacy group agree Motion 71 would make an impact.
“WR YIMBY believes taxing REITs will help level the playing field for all buyers. Using the proceeds of this tax to take a position in sustainable, non-precarious housing reminiscent of non-profits and co-operatives will ensure as many individuals as possible from all stages of life have a spot to call home.”
Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ political economist Ricardo Tranjan showed some REITs were posting double-digit revenue growth in the primary yr of the pandemic, while the remainder of the Canadian economy was expected to shrink by 5.5 per cent.
Morrice’s motion follows a petition he sponsored that was signed by 1000’s of individuals across the country.
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For more information please contact:
Rosalind Horne
Senior Communications Advisor
MP Mike Morrice
226-749-2198
rosalind.horne.445@parl.gc.ca
