When Prime Minister Mark Carney appointed Gregor Robertson as Canada’s new Minister of Housing, Infrastructure, and Communities, the reaction from us in the homebuilding industry ranged from stunned disbelief to resigned frustration. It was already clear that the federal government was floundering on a housing strategy that was created by incompetence, but this appointment sent an unmistakable signal that they’re doubling down on ideology over experience and on image over substance.Let’s be clear: Gregor Robertson’s legacy as the former mayor of Vancouver is one of failures in housing. He presided over an era in which affordability deteriorated dramatically, supply stagnated relative to demand, and policies intended to help people often backfired by creating more barriers than solutions. His tenure left Vancouver with some of the worst housing affordability metrics in the world. And now, Ottawa has handed him the reins for the nation’s housing file..Robertson’s time as Vancouver mayor from 2008 to 2018 was defined by a progressive, activist approach to housing. But virtue signalling and good intentions don’t build homes. Under his watch, property values exploded, rents soared, and middle-class families were priced out of their city. Despite promises to make Vancouver more “inclusive and livable,” the policies implemented under his administration failed to address the core problem: a chronic undersupply of housing.His ‘Vision Vancouver’ government focused heavily on social housing, green urbanism, and noble ideas... ideas that may be found in a university student’s theory book, but ideas that often ignored the basic economic realities of supply and demand. Rezoning efforts were politically charged and glacially slow. The city tangled itself in bureaucratic red tape and exclusionary planning regimes, all while developers tried to bring product to market.Now, with Gregor Robertson in a national leadership role, we are seeing the same flawed thinking embedded in the federal housing strategy. The Liberal government’s housing plan is deeply expensive and will continue to cost tens of billions in taxpayer dollars annually. It will continue to do little to address the core roadblocks that are driving up prices. It noticeably bypasses serious reform of ‘red tape’ by ignoring the increasing cost of home construction, most of which are caused by their own rigid government regulations and delays. It further neglects the issue of returning a portion of the substantial tax revenues generated from new housing directly to taxpayers or municipalities in order to expedite approvals. Worse yet, it doubles down on central planning and federal overreach, instead of fixing the many ‘local bottlenecks’ and ‘ideologies’ that are what truly limits supply. All Canadians will bear the cost of this plan, both financially and through ongoing housing shortages..Today, Canada’s housing crisis is one of the worst in the OECD. The CMHC estimates that Canada requires an additional 3.5 million homes by 2030, just to restore affordability. It is doubtful that is going to happen with a housing minister whose record is more about optics than output.Canada needs a minister who fully understands the mechanics of land development, municipal permitting, capital risk, and the economics of supply. That’s not Robertson! He is billed as an ‘entrepreneur turned politician,’ but his housing experience is limited to presiding over a decade of declining affordability in one of Canada’s largest cities.To be fair, the Liberal Party doesn’t have a deep bench of housing expertise. But if the goal was to pick someone even remotely qualified, there were better options. For instance, Small Business Minister Rechie Valdez possesses a solid understanding of entrepreneurship and has worked in corporate banking for 15 years. She would have been a better choice: while she’s not a housing veteran, she at least represents a pragmatic voice who may be open to collaboration with builders, developers, and municipalities..However, this appointment feels and looks like doubling down on a failed experiment that we have already experienced under his predecessor, Sean Fraser. He spent billions with very few results, after creating a catalogue of homes. In Robertson’s case, he risks replicating Vancouver’s failed policy mistakes on a national scale..Ottawa urgently needs a change in perspective! Housing is not merely a social issue; it is an economic, infrastructure, and productivity issue. And it needs to be treated like one! We need to expedite approvals, lessen the tax burdens on new construction, and ultimately accept the notion that increasing market-rate supply contributes to the solution.If Robertson wants to prove us skeptics wrong, he’ll have to change course from his own track record. But so far, there’s little reason to believe that will happen.Prime Minister Mark Carney — at a time when Canada desperately needs a strong leader in the housing sector and is in the middle of a national housing emergency — appointed the virtue-signalling Gregor Robertson, who by history turned Vancouver into a museum of unaffordable "for sale" signs. This is just not just a poor decision. It is the very essence of a bottleneck.Canadians are stuck and will continue to be so in a never-ending loop of high prices, feeling trapped, or just sitting around waiting for a home they can afford for their family or to become more independent. But I fear they are faced once again with a healthy dose of empty sayings, a lot of unfulfilled promises, and a doubtful solution. I hope he proves me wrong!
