Last week, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre visited St. Catharines, Niagara Falls, Welland, Stevensville and Niagara-on-the-Lake. Pictured: Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre. Photo Credit: Pierre Poilievre/X.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre was in Niagara last week, touting his plan to build more homes and tackle housing affordability for Canadians.
Poilievre visited St. Catharines, Niagara Falls, Welland, Stevensville and Niagara-on-the-Lake.
On many of his stops, Poilievre was joined by local Conservative Members of Parliament, including Niagara Falls MP Tony Baldinelli, who spoke at Poilievre’s event in Niagara-on-the-Lake.
Speaking to a crowd in St. Catharines, Poilievre noted that housing prices in Niagara Region have more than doubled since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took office.
He also pointed to the fact that houses are far, far cheaper on the other side of the border, less than an hour’s drive away.
Poilievre repeated one of his favourite lines, noting that, in Canada “life was not like this” before Trudeau became prime minister and life will not be like this after he leaves.
In explaining why housing costs are so much lower on the southern side of the Canada-US border, Poilievre pointed to taxes, fees, bureaucracy, lawyers and consultants, among others.
The Conservative leader repeated his pledge to give cities additional funds when they exceed federal housing targets. He also promised to require municipalities to speed up permitting processes, make more land available and cut taxes in order to access those funds.
Poilievre also pointed to his commitment to sell of building and federal land to generate more space for the building of new homes, suggesting that as many as 6,000 federally-owned buildings could be put up for sale.
In addition, Poilievre outlined some key economic policies he hopes to pursue should be become prime minister, including axing the carbon tax, making taxes fairer with more write-offs for workers, lowering the cost of energy by producing more and bringing back more investment to Canada.
Poilievre noted that the federal government now spends more on debt interest than it does on health care and pledged to turn that around by cutting spending and balancing the books. He repeated his long-standing pledge to cut $2 of spending for every additional dollar in spending his government adds to the federal budget.
“We’ll cut back on the waste and we’ll use the savings to balance budgets, bring down interest rates, inflation and income tax, so that you bring home more,” said Poilievre.
Poilievre has yet to outline exactly what his proposed income taxes would look like, but he has long pledged to make cutting income taxes a part of his 2025 election campaign.
Recent polling has shown the Conservatives with leads over the governing Liberals ranging from 13 percentage points to 21 percentage points. The Tories are also polling well in Ontario and will be competitive in virtually every riding in the Niagara area in next year’s election campaign.
Jay Goldberg is the Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. He previously served as a policy fellow at the Munk School of Public Policy and Global Affairs. Jay holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Toronto.
