We all deserve a home. Having a safe, stable and affordable place to live is the foundation for everything else.
But for too many Canadians, a home is hard to find. That’s why I am so happy to have worked closely with Minister Jean-Yves Duclos to launch our government’s 10-year, $40 billion National Housing Strategy that will ensure that fewer people than ever will be without a home over the next decade.
Reaching Home is a redesigned, properly funded and community-led federal homelessness strategy that can give cities like Thunder Bay the resources it needs to tackle homelessness. And it is designed to be led by communities, meaning organizations, cities, families and people who are without a home can work together.
We heard that the best approach to make long-lasting change was to ensure that people who know their communities best have control over how and what to do. We will be giving cities more information very soon as they prepare and plan for these changes and we expect that projects will begin in April of 2019.
Many people know that I have been working on housing and homelessness for a long time. And through that work, I learned from many people and organizations that the best way to solve this problem is to empower people and communities to create solutions that are culturally and regionally appropriate. I believe that empowering communities will help us reach our goal of cutting chronic homelessness in half over the next decade. I am hopeful that together, we can do this even faster. Thank you to everyone that has contributed to our government’s planning process. Together we will help so many more reach home.
Learn more about Reaching Home: https://www.canada.ca/en/employment-social-development/news/2018/06/reaching-home-canadas-homelessness-strategy.html
Hon. Patty Hajdu, Member of Parliament for Thunder Bay-Superior North and Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Labour
