Federal budget 2024: Government office buildings in Montreal to be converted into housing

The federal government plans to lease some government office buildings for housing, including some in Quebec, and federal land, according to the budget released Tuesday.

The Liberal government announced in its 2024 federal budget that it would allocate $1.1 billion over 10 years to convert 50 percent of its buildings, saving $3.9 billion over that time.

In Montreal, the budget shows the offices of the National Film Board on the Côte-de-Lisse near the Métropolitan, which will soon house 100 houses. Ottawa is also spending $4 million over two years on new shelters at four sites across the country.

This includes the highly sought-after Wellington Basin, which has been debated for years. Roxborough, Trois-Rivières and Beauharnois will also have post offices converted to housing.

Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante said on social media that she was happy to see measures to speed up access to more homes.

Housing group FRAPRU says it is pleased the feds are focusing on this, but is concerned that all this property will go to private developers and will not include social or affordable homes.

“We are concerned that too many of these apartments will be largely given to the private sector and … so we are, if I may say so, deceived by how they have presented the initiatives as to how they are going. distribution or use of their plots to support housing development,” said FRAPRU Coordinator Catherine Lussier.

CTV News also spoke with Renaud Brossard, vice-president of communications at the Institut de Economique de Montréal (IEDM), who said Ottawa could take a page from Quebec's 2024 budget by looking at the number of bureaucrats and trying to make government more efficient. .

“Since the Trudeau government took office, there have been about 100,000 federal bureaucrats working in the federal government. When we adjust for population growth, that's a 28 percent increase.” Brossard said.

“I don't know about you, but I don't feel that federal services are being delivered well at 28 percent.”

The federal Liberals announced Tuesday they will cut 5,000 public service jobs over four years.

Some other aspects of the budget that will affect Quebec include more money for high-frequency rail between Quebec City and Toronto and more contracts for the Davie Shipyard in Lévis.

Quebec Finance Minister Eric Girard said he would respond to the budget Wednesday morning.