Affordable housing report card gives failing grades to governments.

OTTAWA -- The Canadian, provincial and territorial governments have failed to uphold the 2001 Affordable Housing Framework Agreement says the National Housing and Homelessness Network, prompting the organization to demand more money for housing, more accountability from governments and an emergency summit on housing.

In its housing report card, the NHHN notes of the 32,000 new affordable homes to be funded through the Housing Framework only 7,500 affordable housing units have been launched, most of which are in Quebec. As well, only 1200 units have been committed in the rest of the country.

"Even worse, many of the new homes in Quebec and across Canada are not affordable to low-income households, the people who need the new housing the most," the NHHN says.

Calling for more federal, provincial and territorial money to be spent on affordable housing, the NHHN stresses that the "One Percent Solution", whereby the federal government injects $2 billion annually for housing with the provinces and territories matching those funds yearly, "is the minimum required to meet the nationwide affordable housing crisis and homelessness disaster."

To date, the report notes, the federal government has committed $1 billion over five years or $200 million per year, which is only 10 per cent of the NHHN target. To make matters worse, neither the provinces nor the territories have matched the federal funding.

In addition, to more funding for affordable housing, the NHHN also called for more accountability for the committed housing funds and for any new monies, instead of those funds being caught in "inter-governmental log-jams."

As well, the report card notes that if the provinces and territories "are not willing or able to, meet the housing commitments they made, then the federal government should by-pass them and deal directly with willing municipalities."

Finally, the NHHN has demanded an emergency national housing summit be held for federal, provincial and territorial ministers to deal with two agenda items that include a specific plan to break the jurisdictional logjam to ensure that the committed housing dollars be distributed across the country, and a specific plan to "inject the additional dollars that are needed to meet the goal of the One Percent Solution."