By Nicole Storeshaw, Director of Government Relations, CHBA
CHBA’s annual Day on the Hill is a signature event for the association. Member leaders and HBA staff from across the country meet with Cabinet Ministers, Members of Parliament and other officials to help boost the year-round federal advocacy done by CHBA. This year, delegates gathered in Ottawa with an even more determined vigour. Since last year’s election of a new prime minister, there has been a shift back by the government to affordable housing, with less focus on homeownership and policies to support it. So, armed with new and compelling public opinion survey data, CHBA delegates spread out across Parliament Hill on a cold and snowy day to remind politicians that Canadians still want to own a home, but government actions and plans are not nearly enough.
Record-breaking number of engagements
On Feb. 10, delegates participated in a record-breaking number of meetings for any Day on the Hill hosted by CHBA. Proving that market-rate housing supply and affordability remain key issues, 84 meetings with Ministers, MPs and other senior officials took place. That is an impressive number considering the number of competing events and issues taking place in Ottawa at the same time, including the ongoing budget debate.
“Being able to feature the cross-country strength of the Association further reinforced the scale and importance of the residential construction sector and the challenges our membership is facing,” says CHBA CEO Kevin Lee. “It really helped to drive home CHBA’s recommendation in today’s environment of falling homeownership housing starts and layoffs happening due to current crisis conditions, particularly in Ontario and British Columbia.”
Speaking as one association and bringing the same messages and recommendations to those meetings is crucial. This is why there is a mandatory training session the day before meetings take place. CHBA delegates have a reputation for being very well prepared and coming with solutions, not just complaints. The training session equips members with an overview of the current political environment in Ottawa, followed by an extensive review of CHBA’s federal policy recommendations. This year’s training session included a fireside chat between Lee and Official Opposition Shadow Minister for Housing, MP Scott Aitchison.
Participants were then provided with best practices on advocacy and how to (or how not to) conduct a meeting with an MP. This exercise was helped by a couple of meeting simulations and further practice within the delegate teams.
New public opinion survey reinforces advocacy
New public opinion research conducted by Abacus Data for CHBA shows widespread dissatisfaction with federal efforts to improve homeownership affordability, with fewer than one in five Canadians satisfied with current federal action. This was, of course, highlighted with politicians.
Canadians still have a strong desire for homeownership. According to the polling, 88 per cent of those under 45 would like to own a home one day. But homeownership rates have been falling severely since 2011 due to a lack of affordability, and today only 29 per cent of non-homeowners are confident they will ever be able to purchase a home.
Canadians point to Ottawa as responsible for fixing the housing crisis: 65 per cent say the federal government is most responsible for the housing affordability crisis, and 66 per cent say it’s most responsible for solving the problem, but only 17 per cent think they’re doing enough to address affordability for homeownership.
CHBA delegates deftly utilized this data in their meetings with politicians and stressed that the federal government’s focus on non-market housing is seen as insufficient on its own. Thirty-one per cent of those surveyed said “much more” focus should be placed on homeownership affordability, compared to 17 per cent for non-market housing.
Getting the word out
CHBA began its Day on the Hill advocacy before the event, deploying a variety of pointed ads using the Abacus data that were aimed at policymakers. From targeted social media posts on LinkedIn and X, to banner ads on websites where they spend time, to an op-ed in the Hill Times, CHBA’s messaging helped fuel the interest in meeting with our delegates to discuss housing. This year, CHBA also deployed two bus shelter ads at strategic locations in front of Parliament and the Finance building, where policymakers frequently walk.
Delegates amplified the messaging during the Day on the Hill, posting group photos with MPs and thanking them for meeting while reiterating CHBA’s recommendations. Together, delegates made more than 110 posts that day, which CHBA reshared. LinkedIn was the placed to be, and CHBA’s LinkedIn profile had more than 18,000 organic impressions in the two weeks around the event.
CHBA policy recommendations
Day on the Hill delegates took this data, along with CHBA recommendations, to drive home the message that Canadians need and expect much more to be done in support of homeownership policies.
CHBA’s policy infoguide, Unlocking the Door to Homeownership – Recommendations on the Federal Role 2026, provides a pathway to housing affordability and supply, especially for homeownership. These are the recommendations that members and HBA staff brought forward:
1. Return to federal leadership and a comprehensive approach to affordability for market-rate housing now, and lead collaboration with provinces and municipalities on affordability and supply.
2. Lower taxes to address affordability and get the market moving by broadening GST relief to all buyers and extend to renovations that add new units, such as secondary suites and ADUs. Use all levers available to have municipalities reduce development taxes and collaborate to find alternative funding models.
3. Fix the stress test by eliminating it on uninsured mortgages and make it dynamic on insured mortgages.
4. Maintain and increase housing-supportive infrastructure and transit investments and tie them to housing affordability and supply outcomes.
5. Remove municipal barriers and red tape within the homebuilding process. Catalyze municipal process improvements by tying them to housing supply outcomes (zoning, bylaws, approval/permitting delays, NIMBYism) and harmonize all municipal building- and development-related regulations.
6. Avoid adding costs through codes and regulations. Pause all changes to the National Building Code, as Australia has done. Revisit the 2025 code to reduce costs and complexity before adopting, adopt affordability as core code objective and establish a national code interpretation centre.
7. Support housing affordability and supply through renovation measures including introducing renovation tax credits for first-time homebuyers and energy efficiency retrofits. Make Net Zero renovations eligible for GST rebate.
8. Address labour shortages by growing the domestic workforce, updating the immigration system and supporting increased productivity
Reception and debrief
To continue the conversations that took place during the meetings and connect with more key policymakers, CHBA hosted a reception in the evening at the Chateau Laurier. The reception was well attended by MPs, Senators, other staff and officials. Some MPs attended because a daytime meeting did not fit into their schedule, but many others who already had meetings wanted to spend more time with delegates to talk housing.
Federal Minister of Housing and Infrastructure Gregor Robertson was the guest speaker at the busy and lively event. While his speech emphasized the government’s focus on social housing, he did acknowledge the importance of home builders and developers. CHBA CEO Lee and President Curtis Mercer were able to meet with Minister Robertson following his appearance to reiterate that while social housing is important, the government’s focus on its new agency, Build Canada Homes, will deliver only one per cent of the new housing supply needed to meet the government’s own targets of 500,000 new homes per year.
The following day, during the CHBA Board of Directors meeting, there was a debrief where delegates discussed how CHBA messages were received during the previous day’s meetings.
“As a participant, I can say that the Day on the Hill was a great experience,” said Mercer. “Each area of the country has its own particularities, but when we come together for this event, we’re all bringing the same message in a united front, while sharing our personal experiences to bring those recommendations to light. I think everyone came away feeling energized and encouraged that we hit the right notes and generated even more momentum with policymakers.”
Next steps
Coming out of the Day on the Hill, CHBA followed up with the MPs and officials who met with delegates to thank them for the meetings and provide any additional information that they sought. However, CHBA’s advocacy work is never done.
Going forward, CHBA will continue to strongly engage with the federal government to push for more policies to support affordability and homeownership, including in the Spring Economic Statement. CHBA will also continue to roll out the data contained in the Abacus Data survey (see more info on page 24). This information will be very valuable in advocacy efforts as well as in media outreach. The 2026 Day on the Hill has set a high bar for the federal government to unlock the door to homeownership.
