Housing crisis? “It’s not that different from what we live in Canada”

A executive director of the federal agency of housing, Ana Bailão, considered similar housing crises in Portugal and Canada and defended housing as essential.

The head of Build Canada Homes, former vice president of the Toronto City Council, spoke to the Lusa agency on the shore of the third Coração de Portugal gala, held on Saturday in Vaughan, in the outskirts of Toronto, when questioned about recent protests in Lisbon against rising rents and difficulties in accessing housing.

“What people are living in Portugal is not very different from what we live in Canada,” said Ana Bailão, pointing to the growing difficulties of middle-class families in buying or renting housing in both countries.

The Portuguese-Canadian leader considered that rising housing prices, pressure on family income and worsening the situation of homeless people are common problems for Portugal and Canada, requiring responses that go beyond traditional measures to support the real estate sector.

“ It is an increasingly difficult middle class in the purchasing power of home. It is an increasingly difficult middle class until paying their rents”, he said.

Born in Vila Franca de Xira, in the district of Lisbon, Ana Bailão grew up in Alenquer and emigrated to Canada in 1991, at age 15, having settled with the family in the Davenport area of Toronto, where an important Portuguese community lives.

Graduated from the University of Toronto, she was elected city councilwoman in 2010, having served until 2022, including five years as vice president of the City Council.

He applied for president of the municipality in 2023 and was appointed Executive Director of Build Canada Homes in September 2025, after a career in municipal policy and affordable housing development.

The statements arise at a time when Portugal is going through a new wave of social dispute related to access to housing, particularly in Lisbon and Porto, where thousands of people participated in demonstrations during October.

Faced with the Portuguese situation, Ana Bailão argued that the response to the housing crisis requires a more active public intervention, based on investment, the availability of land and the acceleration of construction.

“These are problems affecting both countries. And here in Canada, fortunately, the government has taken initiatives. Initiatives such as the one I am leading at the federal level,” he said.

The former mayor explained that Build Canada Homes, created by the Canadian Government in September 2025, seeks to increase the supply of affordable housing through financial instruments, partnerships with non-profit organizations and use of land belonging to the State.

“What we’re doing is using public land. The federal government created the organization and gave us mechanisms, being a very large capitalization ", explained.

According to the Canadian Federal Budget for 2026, presented on Thursday, Build Canada Homes will have a total capitalization of 45 billion Canadian dollars (about 28.6 billion euros), with the aim of supporting the construction of 200,000 homes throughout the country over the next ten years.

The document provides for a strengthening of US$13 billion (about EUR 8.3 billion) over ten years, aimed at increasing affordable housing construction and agency intervention capacity.

Ana Bailão pointed out that the combination of public funding, state land and partnerships with community entities allows reducing construction costs and developing projects that would hardly advance only through the private market.

“It’s the flexibility to be able to use this money in partnerships with non-profit organizations. It is to use this money for the acceleration of constructions with more modern modes of construction ", explained.

The person responsible considered that the modernisation of construction methods is one of the fundamental conditions for responding to the lack of housing, allowing for the reduction of implementation times and increasing productivity of the sector.

“It is the possibility of using land that is in the government’s power to take away this cost in the production of houses,” he added.

Asked about which of these solutions could be applied in Portugal, Ana Bailão pointed out the importance of using public land, speeding up licensing and creating financial instruments to meet the needs of different groups of the population.

The Executive Director of Build Canada Homes stressed that the housing crisis does not only affect people with lower incomes, it also affects middle-class families who, despite working, face difficulties to bear the cost of a house.

“What we have to do is a healthier housing system, which is what we don’t have here,” he said.

Ana Bailon argued that the response to housing shortages should cover all situations, from homeless people to families seeking to buy homes, recognizing that each segment requires different intervention instruments.

“ The solutions to house care for homeless people are completely different from the solutions for the middle class. But these solutions all have to be taken along the housing continuum”, he explained.

The person responsible warned that the problems in a particular segment of the market end up affecting the others, hindering housing mobility and exacerbating the difficulties of access to housing.

“ We cannot expect the housing market to be healthy when there are points in it that are not working right, because this later is a matter of jail”, he noted.

Among the measures considered priority, Ana Bailão highlighted the simplification of administrative procedures and the reduction of the deadlines for approval of construction projects by municipal authorities.

“ We need to speed up construction methods to have more homes to be made faster. We have to have the approval of chamber permits, all this faster so that the houses can be made faster ", said.

The person responsible also argued that land belonging to the different public administrations should be made available for housing construction, seeking to reduce one of the main costs associated with the production of new houses.

The Executive Director of Build Canada Homes considered that the multiplicity of economic factors makes it particularly difficult to find quick and lasting solutions to a problem that affects both the most vulnerable population and middle class families.

Despite these difficulties, Ana Bailion argued that governments should change the way they view the sector, favoring the social function of housing.

For the Portuguese-Canadian responsible, housing must be understood as a fundamental need of families and not only as an instrument to generate financial income.

“If a government looks at housing and treats housing as an essential asset, and not only as an investment vehicle, certain decisions start to be taken differently,” he concluded.