Ontario’s housing minister is defending his decision to count long-term care beds towards the province’s housing targets, even as data shows some communities added more long-term care beds than new houses in 2023.
Housing figures for 2023, shared with Global News by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, show some communities have had hundreds of long-term care beds added to their total housing starts, with one breaking 1,000 new beds.
According to the data, Ottawa saw more than 1,200 new long-term care beds — representing 12 per cent of its housing starts for the past year.
“Good; that is awesome,” Housing Minister Paul Calandra said when asked about the figures at Queen’s Park.
“It shows that we’re building long-term care homes in parts of the province that never had them before. It shows that our program to build long-term care is working and it shows communities that never had them before are finally getting them. I think that is actually great news.”
Several Ontario communities have seen a large percentage of their housing starts made up of long-term care beds.
In Markham, 320 (22 per cent) of its 1,472 were long-term care beds, 256 of Burlington’s 584 housing starts were long-term care beds and 192 of 797 housing starts in Ajax were long-term care beds.
Other communities with a high number of long-term care beds include:
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- Peterborough: 50.5 per cent, 256 beds out of 506 housing starts
- Belleville: 45 per cent, 288 beds out of 644 housing starts
- Clarington: 44 per cent, 224 beds out of 506 housing starts
- Whitchurch-Stouffville: 36 per cent, 416 beds out of 1,141 housing starts
Two smaller communities saw significantly more long-term care beds than homes. Sarnia had 94 housing starts in 2023 and North Bay recorded 42 — both added 160 long-term care beds each.
Under the province’s Building Faster Fund, cities that meet their housing targets are rewarded with extra money for infrastructure projects.
The City of Toronto was handed $114 million by Premier Doug Ford as a “reward” for meeting its goal recently, while Brampton landed just over $25 million.
Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said rewarding cities for meeting their goals with beds — which are handed out by the city and not in control of local councillors — could be a “warped” system.
“The system of rewarding some municipalities over other municipalities is a little bit warped and misdirected, Stiles, who agreed with Calandra that a long-term care bed should count as a home, said.
“And at the end of the day, it’s all about results.”
Ontario Liberal MPP John Fraser went further and said the government’s inclusion of long-term care beds was “deceptive” in its housing data.
Fraser argued that “any reasonable person” would not consider a long-term care bed to be a home.
“The government’s fluffing their numbers,” Fraser told Global News
“I don’t know why they’re doing it. It’s deceptive, it’s misleading, it’s unreasonable to do that.”
Calandra stood behind the policy Tuesday, saying it was part of a push to provide a “spectrum” of housing in the province.
“I am not going to back down on this: a long-term care home, for the people who are living in long-term care, is very much a home,” he said.
“And that is why we’re making significant investments in long-term care.”
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