Singh will fight money laundering to ease B.C. housing costs
NDP leader also pledges more money to RCMP to combat problem
VANCOUVER — NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has released a bundle of platform pledges he says will make life more affordable for families in British Columbia — especially when it comes to the sky-high cost of housing.
Singh announced Wednesday that an NDP government would take new actions and put forward the funding necessary to tackle money-laundering and speculation in the housing market. The efforts, he said, to address the crisis would build on some of the real-estate measures the province has introduced.
“Money-laundering and speculation are driving up the cost of housing and it means that it’s simply unattainable, unimaginable for far too many Canadians to ever own a place,” Singh told reporters in Vancouver. “Many people can’t even find a place that they can afford to rent.”
Money-laundering is a key issue in B.C.
The provincial NDP government launched a public inquiry after commissioning two reports that revealed an estimated $5 billion in dirty money was funnelled through real estate in 2018, driving up prices by at least five per cent, and the province has no federally funded RCMP officers committed to collaring money-launderers. Real estate is useful to moneylaunderers because even legitimate transactions can involve large sums and it’s hard to say definitively when a price is inflated.
Singh vowed Wednesday to dedicate a unit of the RCMP to track and fight money-laundering. The NDP would provide $20 million — including $10 million specifically for B.C. — to pay for the staffing costs of officers.
Singh also promised a 15-percent federal tax on housing purchases by foreign buyers to deal with speculators, on top of the 15-to-20-per-cent taxes already levied in some parts of B.C. The tax would apply to buyers who aren’t citizens or permanent residents.