Carney, Poilievre take their campaigns to the GTA today

By Canadian Press on April 10, 2025.

OTTAWA — Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is promising to make it easier for cities to cut the cost of building new homes.

The Conservative plan would see the federal government reimburse cities for half of every dollar they cut in development charges, up to a maximum of $25,000 per home.

The party says that would result in a maximum of $50,000 in savings for the companies that pay the development charges, which help to fund new infrastructure for housing, like roads and sewers.

A Conservative backgrounder document did not specify whether there would be a mechanism to force developers to pass on those savings to homebuyers.

Asked how the party knows that developers would pass on the full savings to homebuyers, a Conservative spokesperson pointed to a portion of the document that says cities would be “required to publicly report their development charges and explain how the savings and federal funds will be used.”

The Liberals and Conservatives are both campaigning in the Greater Toronto Area today.

Liberal Leader Mark Carney is set to make an announcement in Brampton, Ont., in the morning and meet with supporters and volunteers in Hamilton, Ont., in the afternoon.

Poilievre will follow his morning press conference in Milton, Ont., with a rally in Woolwich, Ont., in the evening.

As of 2021, the population of the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area was over seven million — almost 20 per cent of Canada’s population.

A new Leger poll, which was conducted online and can’t be assigned a margin of error, suggests that 48 per cent of Ontarians will vote Liberal in the election, while 39 per cent will vote Conservative and nine per cent will vote NDP.

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh will be in Saskatoon today, where he will make an announcement and meet with the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 10, 2025.

Anja Karadeglija, The Canadian Press