Prime Minister Carney launches plan to end homelessness within 10 years in Budget 2026

Thank you very much Ben, Premier Canoe, Mayor Gillingham, Mayor Martinez-Ferrada, Mark Chipman, David Thompson, Grand Chief Daniels, leaders of the Red River Métis, Minister Gooden, and I also want to recognize, although it's hard to see with the lights, I want to recognize the many Winnipeggers here today who serve this community by caring for those in need. The The outreach workers, shelter staff, nurses, counselors. Volunteers who show up day after day, night after night, to help their fellow citizens. Yesterday, we tabled in Parliament the federal budget for 2026. And we tabled that to become metchenu, masters of our destiny. To what purpose? We tabled it so that we can more fully live those values. In an increasingly turbulent world, Canada is determining our future. We have the strength to build, the discipline to deliver, and the values to take care of each other. And so the budget is the next step of our ambitious and pragmatic and generational plan to make Canadians, as I said, metcheznous building our sovereignty and giving us the freedom to live our lives as we choose. That means investments that build our sovereignty. So entrepreneurs are empowered to grow. So that ideas become companies. So artists and creators can tell our stories. So we have energy that we generate and control. So that Canadians have more choice and lower cost. And so that there is a home for every Canadian. La souveraineté commence chez vous. Elle se traduit par les choix que les Canadiennes et les Canadiens font chaque jour. How they heat their homes, how they get to work, comment ils payent pour leur service bancaire et internet et comment ils gèrent le budget des épiceries et les dépenses essentielles. C'est pourquoi ce budget va encore plus loin pour rendre la vie plus abordable. Nous augmentons le montant de l'allocation canadienne pour les besoins essentiels pour que les familles aient un peu plus d'argent dans les poches. Nous encourageons une plus grande concurrence en permettant aux gens to more easily change banks or provide free telecommunications services to lower prices permanently. Nous rendons aussi le crédit canadien pour aide for Natural Help fully refundable. For all the people who take care of a loved one to receive the support they are entitled to. But we must go even further. Being at home does not mean much to people who do not have a home. La crise de l'itinérance qui s'est aggravée depuis la pandémie Here in Winnipeg, as in many cities across Canada, the homelessness crisis is acute. It starts with people who are just getting by, then something goes wrong. A lost job, a family breakdown, an illness, an addiction. More often, several blows come all at once. And when the systems that are meant to help can't cope, people fall through. And for too many, homelessness doesn't end quickly. Most people experiencing homelessness in Winnipeg have been without a home for six months or more. Some have lived this way for years, some for decades. The basics that most of us take for granted – a shower, a bed, a door that locks – become a daily struggle. Maggie Helwig describes homelessness as, and I quote, more than anything else, a life of constant displacement. It's also dangerous. Extreme temperatures. No easy access to a doctor, a meal or a bed. Every year here at Hope Alley, just off Main Street, this community holds a memorial for those who died on the streets. Two weeks ago, nearly 200 names were read out loud. People lost to homelessness and to toxic drugs, some known only as John or Jane Doe. There are similar memorials across our country. Torontonians gather at the Church of the Holy Trinity, Edmontonians at the Memorial Plaza, Les Montrealaises et les Montrealais au Carré Cabot. When people have nowhere to go, the whole community feels it, in our emergency rooms, on our transit system, in our downtowns. Today, across Canada, an estimated 65,000 people are without a home. People staying in emergency shelters and transitional housing, sleeping in cars and encampments and doorways. Canada's strength and our compassion must be put to work for those who need it the most because Canada Strong starts in a warm home. And just as there's no single way into homelessness, there's no single way out. There's no simple answer. This is a hard problem. And hard problems demand the humility to learn from previous well-intentioned efforts that have fallen short. And it demands the resolve to build on what's succeeded. For decades, governments and communities have tried to address this crisis. Too often these efforts have been inadequately resourced, poorly coordinated, and not sustained. We're learning from these experiences. And as we Above all, and we learn above all, from the people working on the front lines, many of whom are with us here today. And what works, what we get from those learnings, comes down to a combination of three things. First, help works. Help can start before someone ever loses their home. Covering the rent when a paycheck falls short. A call to a landlord. Support when a family is in crisis. And for someone already on the street, HELP is an outreach worker who knows their name and gets them to a warm bed at night. HELP can be a way forward, replacing a lost ID, getting income support, finding a job and a permanent home. And that's what reaching home helps do. Through this program, the Canadian government backs local organizations that do this work every day on the ground across Canada. Here in Winnipeg, that support flows through organizations such as End Homelessness Winnipeg, an Indigenous-led group that lifts people out of homelessness and maintains vital real-time data. That data tells us that four out of every five homeless Winnipeggers are Indigenous, and their work helps to reach them, as does Chalmers Neighbourhood Renewal Corporation. Which helps families keep their homes by sitting down with the landlord, covering back rent and providing one-to-one support. And the North End Women's Centre, where women and gender diverse people can find a safe place to stay while they get back on their feet. So help works. The second thing that works, obviously, is housing. And that means transitional homes as a safe bridge out of crisis and deeply affordable homes so that the bridge leads somewhere permanent to live. And it means that the help continues as needed. So today we're standing on the construction site for the Waweinanay Bagananagon, formerly known as the Hudson's Bay building. When this structure opens, reopens, it will provide 373 affordable homes for First Nations families. Safe homes, permanent homes, in the heart of downtown, led by the community that it serves. A landmark of the past becoming homes for the future. And the third thing that works and is essential is health. For the most vulnerable in our society, this is a further requirement. Now, not everyone without a home needs health care, but most desperately do. Nine in ten people on the Winnipeg streets face a health challenge, most often addiction, mental illness or both. And for them, the emergency room becomes their only respite, but it's a temporary respite. They're treated, discharged, and then they go straight back onto the street, and the cycle begins again. There is, however, a better way. In Toronto, the University Health Network built Dunhouse, a four-storey modular building, 51 homes for the people who use the ER the most, with care right on site. It was built in partnership. The hospital, the City of Toronto, United Way, the charity Fred Victor, the Province of Ontario and the Government of Canada, all working together. The early results are striking. ER visits cut in half, days in hospital down 80%, an entire community that benefits. So when something works and the need is great, we should do more of it. And that's exactly what we're proposing to do in Budget 2026, to help set Canada on a path to end homelessness over the next decade. To get there, we are investing an unprecedented $30 billion in a coordinated national plan. Now, I want to be clear, we understand both how difficult this will be, but equally how imperative it is that we all succeed. Because in Canada, we know we're not perfect, but we always strive to be good, and we do things because they're right, not because they're easy. Ending homelessness is hard, and it's good, and it's right. And it will require more than compassion, it will require ambition, execution, and partnership amongst all levels of government. with contributions from philanthropy and business. The federal government will provide the funds it needs to build housing and health institutions. Provinces and municipalities will manage these housing and health institutions. They will also provide health care, professional training services, and measures to support the necessary income. And philanthropic organizations and businesses will be able to contribute to each step. So our plan is built on what we've learned that works – help, housing, health. Let me say a few words about each. Start with help. Budget 2026 invests $5.5 billion in the Canada Housing Benefit. And that puts money every month directly towards the rent of low-income Canadians. Here in Manitoba, it means families can receive over $300 in monthly payments, and for someone on the edge of homelessness, that can be the difference between keeping a home and losing it. We're also introducing and expanding automatic tax filings, which will help ensure that people get all of the benefits that they deserve. We know that prevention is also vital, is vital in this regard, in keeping people in the homes that they already have. En plus de ces mesures, nous allons investir 6,5 milliards de dollars pour renouveler le programme vers un chez soi et notre soutien aux anciens combattants en situation d'itinérance. Ces fonds vont directement aux personnes et organismes qui nous ont montré ce qui fonctionne. Ces organismes ne font pas que prévenir l'intolérance. They are also going to La Franquante. Next, housing. Budget 2026 makes an investment of $10 billion through Build Canada Homes, and I salute the minister here today. The objective, the intent, Mr. Robertson and his team will build 25,000 transitional and supportive homes across Canada. And as more partners step up across the country, we will ramp that investment up. Here in Winnipeg, What that means is $800 million for more than 2,000 new transitional and supportive homes. And that's possible because we're working with the city of Winnipeg and the province of Manitoba as they choose sites on public land, which will allow us to start sooner and build cheaper. And it's possible because the province will step up and operate these homes and provide the supports that come with them, including helping people with training, finding a job, income support to cover bills, mental health and addictions care, being close at hand. And that brings me to health. Budget 2026 is investing $2 billion more in the Health Infrastructure Fund to build and upgrade mental health and addictions treatment facilities in communities across Canada. And we're committing $5 billion to a new integrated supports fund to build housing and health care together with public, private, and philanthropic partners. And I'm proud to announce that the first investment from that fund, a fund we created yesterday, the first investment, will be over $200 million in federal funding to build the new Winnipeg Centre for Mental Health and Addiction in partnership with the province and with philanthropy. As my colleagues know, this centre will bring acute and outpatient mental health and addictions care together with permanent housing and coordinated support services, and it will be operational as soon as three years from today. So one pathway to help housing and health, and that's how we begin to break the cycle. We're starting in Winnipeg today. Because the Government of Canada, the Province of Manitoba, the City of Winnipeg, and private philanthropy in recent months have all been coming together to develop a comprehensive plan that works. And with other projects already underway in Winnipeg, the Government of Canada is working with partners to build a total of 2,500 new housing units for those most vulnerable. Now, we can do this everywhere. Everywhere across Canada, the Government of Canada is willing to work with every willing partner. Nous renouvelons les mesures de prévention qui permettent aux gens de rester chez eux et nous continuons de financer les organismes on the ground through a program called Vers chez Soi. We are providing the funds needed to build transition homes. A few years ago, let me finish, a few years ago, Al Wiebe, a man who once lived on these streets, gave the alley off Main Street a new name, Hope Alley. And as Al put it, hope is not only life-changing, but life-sustaining. Hope needs something to hold on to, the prospect of help when you need it most, a home of your own, and the health care to keep you well. We have the strength in Canada to build. We have the discipline. And Canadians, we all have the values to take care of each other, to take care of every single Canadian. Budget 26 and today's partnership is how we can not only provide hope, but how we will turn that hope into reality. Thank you very much.