Thomas Mulcair praises Calgary affordable housing; slams feds commitment

NDP leader Thomas Mulcair is in Calgary as part of a provincial tour, but he’s not just here to take in the Stampede.

He toured some affordable housing units in the southwest run by the Calgary Homeless Foundation on Saturday, meeting the people who live and work there.

Mulcair said the lack of a vision federally is hurting Canada, but he said the systems in place in Calgary are admirable and a model for the whole country, adding it’s the most comprehensive system he’s seen in the country.

“There are a lot of foundations involved in this, a lot of people donating their time, a lot of professional who have worked a great deal,” he said. “They’ve worked with the homeless, they’ve worked on harm reduction and they’ve worked on strategies to help people find housing, making that a priority.”

“I met some people who were saintly in their approach and just so selfless in all the time and energy they spend on the issue.”

It’s timely given that earlier in the week, Mayor Naheed Nenshi proudly welcomed the new Inglewood House.

“Happy to see it done, it was built really fast and it is beautiful,” Nenshi said. “43 amazing units for lower-income seniors and there’s still a little bit of vacancy and that’s great.”

But he added the city needs 5,000 units, and while he praised all three levels of government for their involvement in that project, like Mulcair, he said there needs to be more money going into the system.

Mulcair explained that will be hard to do given a lot of federal funding agreements are drying up soon, which is why his party is calling for a national vision to be created.