Housing and mental health alignment excites expert

OTTAWA — There is an “exciting opportunity” for the new housing minister and mental health and addictions minister to work together at the intersection of homelessness and mental health, an expert says.

Dr. Mary Bartram, director of policy and substance use at the Mental Health Commission of Canada, said while the two ministries working together could be powerful, the government should back them with funding.

“Absolutely, the opportunity of those new ministries is only as strong as the resources that follow in behind them,” she said.

Bartram said there are two steps the government can take to begin addressing the problems discovered in her organization’s research, one immediate and the other longer-term.

The first immediate step, she said, can be done before next year’s federal budget is created.

As Canadians head into the winter season, Bartram said, focus could be placed on supports such as emergency relief for those experiencing homelessness and income supports for the homelessness service sector workforce.

“Now’s the time to be looking at those and getting those going,” she said.

Longer-term, she said, federally announced initiatives such as increasing housing stock, a substance use strategy and mental health strategy sound good if they are intertwined.

“So, it’s not in silos, but they’re looking at this complex issue together,” Bartram said.

Housing Minister Ahmed Hussen said he and Mental Health and Addictions Minister Carolyn Bennett “will be very closely aligned.”

Citing the Liberals’ national housing strategy, Hussen said the government understands “the importance of having a lens on our efforts to make sure that those experiencing mental health challenges are also addressed in our housing policy.”

The national co-investment fund, a Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation-administered fund to construct, repair or convert affordable housing, funds projects that incorporate other services such as health, mental health, counselling and substance use services, Hussen said.

Bennett, whose position was recently created as part of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s new cabinet, said both the mental health and national housing strategy should be executed from the bottom up.

“It is about working with those with expertise, but also lived experience, for us to be able to identify the things that are working and be able to scale them into a real integrated strategy,” she said.

She said she will look to leaders at all levels of government for what can be put in place quickly.

In April, housing advocates applauded the government’s oneyear, $1.5-billion extension in its budget of the rapid housing initiative, a program that funds the construction of modular homes and alteration of existing buildings to affordable housing.

The initiative originally planned to create 3,000 units but exceeded that goal with 4,500 units. Hussen said the number was closer to 4,700.

However, Canada’s budget watchdog said in an August report that the Liberals’ national housing strategy has had a limited impact, citing among other reasons that the government has spent less than half of the funding on housing programs, and community housing deals with the provinces have expired.

Yves Giroux, parliamentary budget officer, estimated the number of households in housing need will increase to about 1.8 million by about 2025 unless more funding is provided.