Homelessness

Vancouver trek raises awarness for Libby's national housing strategy bill

June 30, 2010

The Gerogia Straight

Stephen Harper must act on housing or face political priceIn the middle of June, a delegation of eight people from Vancouver travelled to Toronto and Ottawa to kick-start a national campaign to push Stephen Harper’s Conservative government to re-establish a national housing program in Canada. We met with several housing groups in Toronto and others in Ottawa, where we left a few dozen red tents from Pivot Legal Society’s campaign. We also ended a 76-week rolling hunger strike that was aimed at putting pressure on the federal government to act on housing.

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Libby calls on government to support a national housing strategy

May 28, 2010 Question Period

The Big City Mayors (22 mayors representing Canada's largest cities) met in Toronto this week at the annual general meeting of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities. They identified housing and homelessness as a top concern. Libby raised these concerns in Question Period.

HANSARD
HOUSE OF COMMONS
May 28, 2010

Libby Davies (MP Vancouver East):

Mr. Speaker,

Canada’s big city mayors met this week and are calling for a national housing strategy, saying homelessness needs immediate attention.
Yet the government refuses to take a leadership role.

Two single moms, a cancer survivor, and a father of four have been forced to take this government to court for a decent place to live. They want the minister to sit down with all the stakeholders and implement a national strategy to deal with this crisis.

Will this government finally wake up to the growing housing problem in this country and support a national housing strategy?

Libby Davies Named NDP Spokesperson for Housing And Homelessness

May 7, 2010 Press Release

Ottawa – NDP Libby Davies (MP Vancouver East) has been named the NDP’s Spokesperson for Housing and Homelessness.

“Fighting for adequate and safe housing is the reason I got involved in politics over 30 years ago,” said Davies. “With my bill for a National Housing Strategy before the House, and my experience with the issues, I welcome the opportunity to take on this portfolio.”

Libby calls on federal government to keep Vancouver shelters open

April 16, 2010 Open Letters to Ministers & Public Officials

Hon. Diane Finley
Minister responsible for
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
House of Commons
Ottawa, ON K1A 0A6

Dear Minister Finley,

I write to bring your attention to the urgent housing situation in Vancouver, as the city faces the loss of hundreds of emergency shelter beds on April 30, 2010.

Without immediate support, several Vancouver Homeless Emergency Action Team (HEAT) shelters will close at the end of this month, leaving a shortage of 500 beds in a region where the homeless population has grown by 12% since 2008.

The Vancouver Police have said that the shelters are “nothing short of a blessing” and directly attribute a reduction of crime to the availability of housing. The Downtown Vancouver Business Improvement Association is also speaking in support of funding for the shelters as a benefit to the business community, reducing the number of people on the streets and problems with disorderly conduct.

Libby speaking up for affordable housing

March 21, 2010

Kelowna Daily Courier

Libby Davies addresses local NDPOttawa should revive tax incentives that make it attractive for developers to build more rental housing, NDP MP Libby Davies says. The federal Liberals essentially abandoned any involvement in housing in the mid-1990s, and successive governments have also shown little interest in the file, Davies said Saturday in Kelowna. “There were various programs available that provided incentives for the development of rental housing, but they‘re all long gone,” Davies, who represents the riding of Vancouver East, said after addressing local NDP members.

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Nothing solved by eviction - Libby on BC forfeiture laws

March 10, 2010

The Vancouver Province

Bad luck and a bad crowd, but she's 'not a criminal'On a clear, crisp March morning, Marianne Christine Sullivan sits on a dock at Trout Lake in east Vancouver and talks about being homeless and broke after the B.C. government took her $562,000 home under civil forfeiture legislation....Vancouver East MP Libby Davies says the sad situation Sullivan faces as a homeless person likely means it will cost society far more in the long run than what was taken with the forfeiture. "It is unbelievable this could happen to her," she says. "The fact is, she is now living on the street and suffering from an addiction. What has been solved by making her homeless?

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Libby's support for activists' spotlight on homelessness

February 16, 2010

The Vancouver Sun

Activists pitch tent city on Downtown Eastside lotHundreds of homeless and poverty protesters -- using the Olympic spotlight to their advantage -- flooded into a vacant lot in the 100-block of West Hastings Street on Monday and erected a tent city. Libby Davies, NDP MP for Vancouver East, said she supported the tent city as a way to raise awareness for greater government support, especially by a federal government in need of a national housing strategy to help the poor and homeless.... "This is a prime site for social housing," she said. "I'm so happy so many people are here today to draw attention to this issue. It's a vacant lot and it's very visible, a symbol of what's going on in this neighbourhood."

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