On Tuesday, Oct. 18, I’ll be hosting a town hall on housing and affordability with four expert panelists. Each speaker comes from a different housing-related background, so they’ll bring a diverse range of perspectives and considerations to our discussion about the complex, multifaceted challenges facing our housing market.

Over the course of the evening we’ll discuss policy and market conditions that have led to our current situation, analyze the immediate challenges we face and look at where we can go from here. We’ll explore what can be done now to increase housing and rental stock and how we can prepare for the future. And, the fundamental question that underpins everything, what do we want our communities to look like in coming years?

Everyone is more than qualified to speak to the concept of a community vision, and I want to give you the opportunity to do so. Reserving plenty of time for audience questions, comments, and discussion is a priority for the event.

In addition to a community housing advocate and three-term municipal councilor, the Director of the Victoria Real Estate Board and the executive director of Generation Squeeze, one of our panelists will be Alex McGowan, chair of the Alliance of B.C. Students. McGowan and his colleagues recently released a report on the influence student housing demands have on a housing market in crisis. They urge the B.C. government to amend existing restrictions on public entity debt that prevents post-secondary institutions from building more on-campus residences.

“We know that as students, we often occupy the low end of the rental spectrum; what we might not realize is who we may be squeezing out of the market altogether,” McGowan said. “Getting students on campus and out of the rental market helps everyone, including the single parent struggling to find housing, the minimum-wage worker who can’t find a rental they can afford, and those who are currently in housing, but spending more than 50 per cent of their income on rent. Our proposal could go a long way to helping B.C.’s rental market come back to a normal level, and at very little cost to the government. It’s time to help students, improve the quality of education and help alleviate the housing crisis that is hurting everyone.”

Preventing post-secondary institutions from taking on the debt to build more housing on their land is defended by the need to protect B.C.’s high credit rating. While that is indeed important, debt undertaken to build campus housing in B.C.’s desperate market would not impact the government’s credit rating as it would be entirely self-supporting through residence fees.

In the last 10 years, the number of full-time students in B.C. has steadily grown and the number of international students has nearly doubled, yet very few new residence spaces have opened.

In 2014/2015 there were 10,900 students on waitlists for campus housing in B.C., nearly 3,000 of which were on the UVic list alone. UVic has 2,481 residence spaces and in 2014 had 16,649 full-time students. With a rental vacancy rate around 0.6 in Victoria, there is clearly an unsustainable discrepancy between the demand for affordable housing and the supply.

As McGowan and the Alliance of B.C. Students have noted, building more student housing is not just about students. It is about alleviating some of the pressure on an overstretched rental market in a timely and responsible manner.

I hope you’ll join us on Tuesday, Oct. 18 from 7 to 9 p.m. in the Gibson Auditorium at Camosun College (Landsdowne Campus Young Building 216) to discuss this, and other solutions, in greater detail.

MLA Town Hall – Housing and Affordability
October 18th – 7pm to 9pm (doors open at 6:30pm) Camosun College – Landsdowne Campus
Young Building 216 – Gibson Auditorium

Join Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay Gordon Head and Leader of the B.C. Green Party, for an informative Town Hall on housing and affordability in Greater Victoria and throughout the province. Victoria has one of the lowest rental vacancy rates, coupled with rising home prices, which is making the region un-affordable for many, especially students and young professionals, and affecting economic development as new or expanding businesses find it difficult to attract employees.

Our panel of experts will discuss what can be done now to increase housing, and how we can prepare for the future. The discussion and presentations will be followed by an audience question and answer period.

Panel:

Cairine Green – Community Housing Advocate
Alex McGowan – Chair, Alliance of BC Students
Kyle Kerr – Director, Victoria Real Estate Board
Eric Swanson – Executive Director, Generation Squeeze

Everyone is welcome

Today I had the honour of addressing the delegates to the 2016 Convention of the Union of BC Municipalities in my capacity as Leader of the BC Green Party. I took the opportunity to announce that effective immediately, the B.C. Green Party will no longer accept any corporate or union donations. We are a party of the people, for the people and that will be mirrored in our funding structure.

Video of my Speech

Text of my Speech

Please let me start by thanking the Union of BC Municipalities for providing me this opportunity to speak to you today.

The last time I stood before you was in 2013, shortly after I was elected as the MLA for Oak Bay Gordon Head. Now I stand before you as the Leader of the BC Green Party, a party that has grown dramatically over the last few years — a party that is ready and excitedly awaiting the 2017 provincial election.

Politics wasn’t originally in my career plan. I was a Canada Research Chair at the University of Victoria working in the field of climate science.

Anyone who has attended a public lecture or class that I have given on the topic of global warming will know that I boil the entire issue down to one question.

Do we the present generation owe anything to future generations in terms of the quality of the environment that we leave behind?

It’s a complex question that science cannot answer. But if we do believe that the answer is yes, then we have absolutely no choice but to take action now.

To these same classes and in these same public lectures I note that our political leaders do not have to live the long-term consequences of the decisions that they make or don’t make.

Yet these very same decisions will have a profound effect on the type of world we leave behind to our children.

That’s why I subsequently point out that it’s critical for the young adults in the audience to participate in our democratic institutions. And, I’d say to them:

“If there are no politicians willing to tackle those problems, then they should convince someone to run that they can get behind or even consider running themselves.”

Eventually, I knew I couldn’t keep doling out that advice if I was not willing to follow it myself.

So here I am. And here we are.

Ultimately the reason I got into politics is probably very similar to the reason all of you got into politics. I care deeply about my community.

I wanted to do what I could to better it for present and future generations.

And, I was profoundly troubled by the direction that this province was heading.

I could no longer stand on the sidelines and watch the dismantling of British Columbia’s leadership on the climate change file as our government pursued an utterly unrealistic fossil fuel windfall from a hypothetical Liquefied Natural Gas sector in a desperate attempt to win an election that nobody thought they would win.

But, as I learned in my scientific career, and as I tried to teach my students, criticism is easy. What’s more difficult, yet far more valuable, is being constructive in one’s criticism.

If you’ve been watching the BC Greens in the Legislature over the last three years you’ll see that we’ve tried to offer government solutions to the problems challenging our province.

The BC Green Party is a solutions-oriented party — one that fundamentally believes that policy should flow from evidence.

I like to call this evidence-based decision-making, as opposed to what happens too often in politics today — decision-based evidence making.

In the face of sexualized violence plaguing our college and university campuses I didn’t just demand the provincial government do better and publicly thrash them in the media.

My team and I did the research, we consulted far and wide, we asked the right questions, we held town halls, and we wrote the legislation for them.

The government passed my bill within the month. It is now law and our students are safer because of it.

We’ve been able to make significant progress on MSP reform, housing, and affordability, but there is much more to be done.

In my speech to the UBCM in 2013 I emphatically stated that the BC Liberal’s promised LNG industry was not going to materialize. BC becoming a major LNG exporter was nothing more than a pipedream.

It didn’t take long for those promises to start unraveling. But the province is still scrambling to chase a falling stock, doubling down and selling out future generations along the way.

I’ve been saying the same thing now for almost four years.

The market did not, does not and will not, support a BC LNG industry anytime soon.

I stood alone in the BC Legislature voting against the LNG Income Tax Act; I stood alone voicing my opposition to the direction the province was heading.

While the Leader of the Official Opposition was noting:

“we’re going to stand side by side with you and vote in favour of it” (it being the generational sell out embodied in the LNG income tax act),

the BC Liberals were promising 100,000 jobs, a 1 trillion dollar increase to our GDP, a 100 billion dollar prosperity fund, the elimination of the Provincial Sales Tax and thriving schools and hospitals from the wealth to be created by LNG.

And they promised it would already be happening by now.

It is fiscally reckless for us to continue to hope that a nonexistent LNG industry will magically materialize while ignoring the enormous potential British Columbia has for a prosperous future.

Rather than hanging onto, or trying to go back to, the economy of the last century we should be positioning ourselves as leaders in the 21^st century economy.

We have a unique opportunity in British Columbia because of three strategic advantages that we have over virtually every other region in the world.

1. Our high quality of life and beautiful natural environment attracts, and retains, some of the best and brightest from around the globe —we are a destination of choice.
2. We have a highly skilled work force. Our high school students are consistently top ranked — with the OECD specifying BC as one of the smartest academic jurisdictions in the world.
3. We have access to renewable resources — energy, water, and wood — like no other jurisdiction. We have incredible potential to create a clean, renewable energy sector to sustain our growing economy.

But for British Columbia to actually capitalize on our strategic advantages, we must ensure we protect them.

A quality public education is not the luxury of a strong economy. A quality education is what builds a strong economy.

And we must start thinking about the long-term consequences of our decisions, decisions that put people, rather than vested corporate or union interests or re-election goals first and foremost.

So where do we go from here? In the shadows of the massive challenges that we face, our province needs new leadership.

Leaders must have the courage to be honest with British Columbians about the risks and consequences of any government decision.

We need leadership that offers a realistic and achievable vision grounded in hope and real change.

We need leadership that places the interests of the people of British Columbia — not organized union or corporate interests— first and foremost in decision-making.

As a start, political parties must stop accepting corporate and union donations in order to rebuild public trust.

Take the recent Mount Polley experience. The corporation that operates the mine is a substantial donor to the BC Liberals; the union representing the workers at the mine is a substantial donor to the BC NDP.

Whose interests are being served? Who is there to represent the people of British Columbia?

British Columbians and organized groups like the Dogwood Initiative and Fair Vote Canada have been calling for a ban on big money in politics for quite some time.

Our political parties and their MLAs should not be reduced to puppets controlled by corporate or union puppet masters with a firm grip on their purse strings.

The acceptance of this practice is undermining every sector in our province and I am tired of waiting for the B.C. government to do something about it.

I am tired of listening to the official opposition say they will change the system only if they form government. That’s not leadership.

Leadership means leading by example. And the BC Greens commit to doing just that.

Effective today, the B.C. Green Party will no longer accept any corporate or union donations.

We are a party of the people, for the people and that will be mirrored in our funding structure.

Could this move hurt us on the eve of an election? Yes, it could. But real leadership doesn’t come from doing what is easy. It is built on doing what is right.

Leadership means inspiring others to act in ways that contribute to the betterment of their society and it can’t just rest with one person. Everyone here has the opportunity and responsibility of joining me by taking on this mantle of leadership.

In 1962 John F. Kennedy announced that America would send a man to the moon by the end of the decade. He didn’t know how it was going to be done. But he knew, and I quote, “we must be bold”.

He went on to say:

“We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win”

If ever there was a time to be bold it is now. Over the coming weeks and months the BC Greens will lay out a bold vision for a prosperous future.

We’ll start discussions on, and offer pathways forward to, the challenges facing our province in areas such as: affordability, homelessness and poverty, climate change and the decarbonization of our energy systems, responsible resource development, education and health care.

And we’ll do this not because it’s easy, but rather because it’s hard and because it’s the right thing to do. Because the challenge is one that BC Greens will accept as we work towards offering British Columbians a new choice in the 2017 election. An election we intend to win.

Media Statement September 15, 2016
Andrew Weaver Renews Call to Reform Medical Service Premiums
For Immediate Release

Victoria, B.C. – While a freeze in Medical Service Plan (MSP) premium increases is certainly welcome, the government has lost the opportunity to fully reform this regressive tax says Andrew Weaver, MLA for Oak Bay – Gordon Head and Leader of the B.C. Green Party.

“British Columbians will see this MSP announcement for what it is, a cynical ploy to gain votes as we head into an election year”, says Andrew Weaver. “We need to eliminate the MSP, not simply tinker around its edges.”

“Over the last three years I have consistently and continually called for the MSP to rolled into the income tax system with premiums calculated on taxable income rather than the current system which is a flat tax no matter what people earn.” says Andrew Weaver. “This would turn a regressive tax into a fair system much like has already been done in Ontario”

In Ontario, if you earn $20,000 or more a year you pay the Ontario Health Premium (OHP). It ranges from $0 if your taxable income is $20,000 or less, and goes up to $900 per year if your taxable income is more than $200,600. Instead of the mail-out system we have in BC, the OHP is deducted from the pay and pensions of those with employment or pension income that meets the minimum threshold.

“Remember – only Ontario’s top earners are paying $900 per year. Right now people in British Columbia are paying $900 a year regardless of whether they earn $42,000 or $4,200,000 a year.”

“As Leader of the BC Green Party I can affirm that a B.C. Green Party government would eliminate the regressive monthly MSP premiums. Instead, a B.C. Green government would introduce a progressive system in which rates are determined by one’s earnings. And a net and substantive administrative savings to taxpayers would arise in rolling MSP premiums into the existing income tax system.” says Andrew Weaver

– 30 –

Background:

Call to eliminate MSP premiums:

Moving Forward with MSP premiums:

Media contact:
Mat Wright – Press Secretary, Andrew Weaver MLA
1 250 216 3382
mat.wright@leg.bc.ca

Skyrocketing real estate markets across the Lower Mainland and Southern Vancouver Island are dragging the rental market with them.

Frances Bula recently wrote in The Globe and Mail, “as people are shut out of the housing market, more people have no choice but to remain as renters who are competing for a limited supply of housing in a system that has treated renters like second-class citizens for decades.”

She’s right, and for people who are young, non-white, have mental health issues, unemployed, recent immigrants, poor, disabled, or have pets, finding a safe, affordable home can seem nearly impossible in markets with vacancy rates around 0.6 per cent like Victoria.

With constrained real estate mobility, people have little choice but to stay in suites that would have previously been viewed as shorter-term student rentals and I am getting increasingly concerned about where the young people in my riding are going to live this upcoming school year. A representative from Camosun College told us he too is very worried about the situation and described it as a complete crisis with some students living in cars and others forced into overcrowded, expensive shared suites.

We so desperately need more designated long-term rental units in B.C. Spaces that people can make their home, places that welcome children and pets and have some outdoor space. Homes for people who will rent for large portions of their life, either by necessity or choice.

Co-operative housing arrangements are another promising avenue to bridge the gap between the rental and homeownership markets. They provide shareholders with a long-term, sustainable home and create diverse communities, supporting multi-generational residents of varying income levels.

Unfortunately, few co-operative housing developments have been built in B.C. since the 1990s when the federal government released its social housing responsibility to the province and existing units have multi-year waitlists. Given our current housing crisis, and the province’s new Housing Priority Initiatives Fund, I think the B.C. Liberals, in conjunction with municipalities and the federal government, need to step in to help housing co-operatives with land acquisition and planning costs.

Each level of government has various tools available to them that they can use to tackle the housing crisis from different angles. To guide these initiatives we need, and have needed for years, more comprehensive data about the trends impacting our housing market. The information about buyer nationality that the province began collecting this June is a start, but making major policy decisions based on five weeks of data – as the B.C. Liberals did with Bill 28 – is far from ideal.

Knowing that we are going to be faced with challenging housing decisions for years to come, we need to start collecting more data now so we can design informed policy for the future. Determining who is purchasing homes, and how many, in B.C. would allow the government to identify the flow of foreign investments, the role corporations are playing, and whether we are seeing speculation in our market coming from other regions in Canada.

Tracking house flipping (when investors buy a house to quickly resell it at higher price) is an important aspect of understanding an over-inflated market. Imposing a sales tax on homes sold within one or two years of purchase could be an effective way of curbing house flipping but, again, it is a policy that should be founded in comprehensive data.

Studying the impact of Airbnbs, I suspect, would shed a lot of light on changes happening in the rental market. Airbnb has already said it’s open to some restrictions tailored to tight rental markets, including banning hosts from using the popular online platform to run a business renting out multiple units, but governments (municipal and provincial) will need solid data to move forward with such policies.

Long-term and ongoing data collection is vital to the future of homes in B.C. – the sooner we start the better.

Feature photo by Josefontheroad.