Canada is not experiencing 鈥渁鈥� housing crisis. It is experiencing multiple housing crises. For those with vulnerabilities鈥攕uch as mental illness, addiction, domestic violence, disability, or precarious immigration鈥� the risk of homelessness is exacerbated. These crises are the result of long-term policy failures and systemic factors such as increasing unaffordability, inaccessibility and insecure tenure, especially resulting from evictions and repossession.
Homelessness has become an urgent and growing issue across Canada and in most industrialized countries. Between 2020 and 2022, more than 40,000 individuals were experiencing homelessness on a given night in 61 Canadian communities 鈥� a 25% increase from 2018.1 In Quebec, the 2022 homelessness count was 44% higher than in 2018, and the 2024 enumeration points to steep and accelerating rates of increase.2听
The Max Bell School of Public Policy is working in collaboration with the Quebec Homelessness Prevention Collaborative (QHPC) to find creative ways to prevent homelessness and put prevention at the forefront of public debate. The research explores what other countries are doing to realize the right to housing, including a duty to assist people at risk, legislative requirements on municipalities to build social housing, and preventing evictions into homelessness. This research supports the QHPC鈥檚 Legal Reform Project that is co-led by Pearl Eliadis, Associate Professor (professional) at Max Bell, which focuses on the potential for legal reform as part of a suite of policy solutions.
Why focus on prevention?听
Growing and accelerating levels of homelessness, coupled with decreasing affordability and accessibility, have forced emergency services and palliative responses to respond and expand. Past solutions are not working, including 鈥渢reating鈥� people who are already homeless using frontline services like shelters as our main policy response. Without a structured, adequately resourced approach to prevention, structural and systemic efforts to prevent homelessness remain fragmented and underdeveloped, including in Quebec. Housing First and other programmes do exist to help people reintegrate into permanent housing, but they are not developed at sufficient scale in Canada. And there are few legal protections for the right to housing.听听
According to Dr. Eric Latimer, an economist, member of the QHPC team, and a leading researcher on homelessness in Canada, 鈥渨ell-designed prevention programs can be less expensive and also more humane than an approach that relies only on rehousing people who lose their housing.鈥�
Prevention avoids the trauma that people experience on losing their housing in the first place, something which an approach based on alleviating homelessness after it has occurred cannot achieve.听听
Prevention helps governments meet their legal obligation to progressively realize the right to adequate housing (鈥渞ight to housing鈥�). Homelessness is also the most serious violation of the right to housing, as recognized in international human rights law under UN and regional treaties, and in Canadian federal law under the . The right to housing is not the only human right at stake:听 equality rights and the right to security of the person are also protected by both the and Quebec鈥檚 .听听听
Max Bell and the Qu茅bec Homelessness Prevention Collaborative3听
The QHPC was created in 2021 to convene researchers, community organizations, government representatives, and people with lived experience to promote evidence-based recommendations for policy and programs aimed at preventing homelessness in Quebec. It also leads knowledge mobilization efforts to raise awareness, foster dialogue among key stakeholders, and shift the public conversation from crisis management to upstream, preventive solutions.听
The Max Bell School of Public Policy is an academic partner in the QHPC, supporting knowledge events and offering Qu茅bec鈥檚 first academic case study听on homelessness prevention that explores how intersectoral collaboratives and civil society can serve as policy change catalysts.听听
Thanks in part to a Partnership Development Grant Fund from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council,4 research is underway to examine promising ideas, lessons learned and leading practices for policy efforts in Quebec to prevent homelessness, while recognizing the multiple dimensions of the housing crises affecting vulnerable subpopulations.听听
One of those dimensions is legal reform and human rights as drivers of public policy. The Max Bell project, in collaboration with the QHPC, is developing four short research papers examining legal reforms and the relationship between the relative strength of legal frameworks that support the right to adequate housing (鈥渞ight to housing鈥�) in Finland, France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.5 The research aims to introduce a framework for assessing how legal systems鈥攑articularly those offering rights-based solutions that protect the right to housing 鈥攃an support improved housing outcomes and reduce homelessness.听听
Graduate students at the Max Bell School of Public Policy have been researching these legal developments alongside housing trends in country-specific housing outcomes and migration levels.听听
Legal Frameworks and Housing Outcomes: Preliminary Observations听
Using data primarily from the OECD and the World Bank, the project at Max Bell is examining housing outcomes in relation to the following indicators,听听
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housing stock (units per 1,000 population);听听
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social housing stock (as a percentage of total housing stock);听听
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housing cost overburden rates among the bottom 25% of income earners, and听
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homelessness levels.听听
While recognizing that there are methodological differences across countries and institutions for these indicators, international organizations have developed standard definitions that allow for some degree of comparability.听听
The project is tracking key legal developments, with a focus on rights-based approaches that place legal duties on the state to support the most vulnerable people and that create legal recourses for individuals if the State has failed to provide legislated supports to people to assist in accessing housing.听听
Information on the relative strength of legislative systems in each jurisdiction includes measures that prevent homelessness by placing duties on governments to build social housing and affordable housing, creating duties to assist or support people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness, and stronger protections against eviction:听听
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international legal obligations that include the right to adequate housing;听听
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constitutional and quasi-constitutional rights that impose basic standards on all ordinary legislation to respect those rights,听
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non-discrimination and equality rights,听
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legal protections for security of tenure, including those related to preventing evictions into homelessness,听
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legislation that includes minimum targets for the amount of social housing,听听
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legislation that provides for a legal duty to provide assistance and navigation services to people who are homeless and at risk of homelessness,听听
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government policies that are informed explicitly by the right to adequate housing.听
Canada鈥攊ncluding Quebec鈥攍ags behind several OECD countries with comparable levels of economic and social development when it comes to several of these homelessness prevention measures. The research highlights the range of different legal strategies that can be combined to address the multiple facets of the housing crisis and the role that legislative reform can play in addressing homelessness. Preliminary observations on the four countries are set out in the following sections.听
Finland听听
Finland has the strongest constitutional protections for the right to housing among the countries reviewed, with astoundingly low homelessness rates (even considering 2024 data, showing an increase), at approximately 0.06% of the population. Finland鈥檚 explicit constitutional protection of the right to housing combines with a range of legislative protections and strong political will to end homelessness. Social supports, generous housing benefits, a well-developed system of housing advisors who help prevent evictions, along with an ambitious Housing First program, grounded in the right to housing, have contributed to Finland鈥檚 positive outcomes.听
France听
In France, the right to housing is considered a constitutional value, and legislation operates to both mandate the construction of social housing and create individual remedies in certain cases. The SRU law, Loi n掳 2000-1208 du 13 d茅cembre 2000 relative 脿 la solidarit茅 at au renouvellement urbains and the ALUR law, Loi n掳 2014-366 pour l鈥檃cc猫s au logement et un urbanisme r茅nov茅, set minimum percentages of social housing for the French communes, at 20% and 25% respectively, for certain areas.听听
While it is true that municipalities can pay a fine rather than meet requirements, and there are legitimate questions about who gets access to this housing, France鈥檚 level of 14% social housing stock as a percentage of the overall housing supply nonetheless compares favourably to Canada鈥檚 3.4%.6听 France also has the DALO law or Droit au logement opposable that provides an enforceable right to housing for individuals although the legislation has been criticized for not offering a sufficiently robust recourse.7听听
Germany听
Germany has also been struggling with homelessness and a housing crisis, along with significant demographic pressures created by migration. Like Canada, Germany鈥檚 federal structure confers most housing related powers to sub-national governments. At the national level, however, there was a need to respond to demands for affordable housing and to promote tenants鈥� rights (Germany, like Quebec, has a very high percentage of renters).听听听
In response, the Building Land Mobilization Act, passed in 2021, introduced sweeping changes to housing regulation in Germany, simplifying the permitting process and facilitating the preparation of development plans. Most importantly it introduced a near ban on the conversion of rental flats into condominiums, especially in areas with a tight housing market and certain rights of preemption in favour of municipalities (the Act does not apply directly to the Federal State of Berlin, which has an extremely tight housing, market and its own strict housing regulations).听听
United Kingdom听
The UK, which has faced steep increases in homelessness, has introduced a 鈥渄uty to assist鈥� people experiencing homelessness or at risk. Wales, notably, has adopted legislation creating this duty on local officials, based on principles of early prevention, 鈥渘o one left out鈥�, and rapid rehousing in the Housing (Wales) Housing Act, 2014. Under the Act, local authorities are legally obligated to provide homelessness prevention and relief services to eligible persons, subject to prescribed conditions. Individuals who disagree with decisions by local authorities are entitled to seek internal administrative review.听
Next Steps听
MPP students in the 2024-25 cohort, Kiran Gill (focusing on Germany), Camille Haisell (Finland), and Angelina Freeman (France and the UK) have been developing interrupted time series for each country that provide a glimpse into the relationships between legal measures that support the right to housing and housing outcomes, along with tracking migration numbers in each country across the time series. The time series will provide a visualization of the relationship, overtime, between specific legal interventions, and the identified housing outcomes discussed above.听
The research at Max Bell is supervised by Pearl Eliadis), and supported by Leslie Fierro, Sydney Duder Professor in Program Evaluation, and Tim Lane, the 2024-2025 JW McConnell Visiting Professor of practice and former deputy governor of the Bank of Canada. Professor Fierro has been instrumental in identifying the methodology of an interrupted time series to track the relationship between legal interventions and selected housing outcomes. Professor Lane has provided his insights into the key economic considerations in country conditions that may be factors in socioeconomic indicators among the selected countries.听
The team is aiming for publication of the preliminary results in 2025. Further information on the QHPC and its work can be obtained at 听
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听1听Government of Canada. Everyone Counts 2020-2022: Preliminary Highlights Report.听Infrastructure Canada.听
2听Minist猫re de la Sant茅 et des Services sociaux. D茅nombrement des personnes en situation d鈥檌tin茅rance visible au Qu茅bec. Rapport de l鈥檈xercice du 11 octobre 2022. Qu茅bec, minist猫re de la Sant茅 et des Services听sociaux, 2023;听Minist猫re de la Sant茅 et des Services sociaux. Itin茅rance h茅berg茅e au Qu茅bec. Rapport de l鈥檈xercice d鈥櫭﹏um茅ration du 23 avril 2024.听Qu茅bec: 2024.听
3听Thanks to Art Campbell, QHPC Project Director and听Dr.听Eric Latimer, member of the QHPC Steering Committee for their comments on earlier drafts.听听
4听听Latimer E, Hughes J,听Arbaud听C, Campbell听A, Crocker A, Eliadis P, Gervais I, Hanley J, Kamateros M, Nandi A,听Par茅听M, Roy L, Soto J,听Stich听C,听Wachsmuth听D, 鈥淭he Qu茅bec Homelessness Prevention Policy Collaborative: Phase II of a Successful Partnership鈥�,听Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada,听Partnership听Development Grant. March 22, 2024-March 21, 2027, $198,996.听
5听In 2024, an initial review of the legal frameworks related to housing in Finland, France, Germany and the UK was prepared by students of the 黑料不打烊 Faulty of Law, Carla听Arlabaez, Thomas听Bisset, Toby Moore, and Chlo毛听Shaninian.听
6听OECD听听听Housing Cost Overburden Rate.听Housing conditions and听affordability, 2022 or later. The fine imposed on municipalities is paid to the national rental social housing fund.
7听OHCHR, 鈥淓nd of Mission Statement听by the Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing presents her preliminary findings after her visit to the Republic of France, conducted on 2 鈥� 11 April 2019鈥� (12 April 2019), online: <ohchr.org/en/statements/2019/04/end-mission-statement-special-rapporteur-right-adequate-housing-presents-her>.听听
