When Covid-19 hit, even Canada’s own national housing agency seemed sure this was finally the end, predicting a dive in home values ranging from bad to catastrophic. But instead the market went on to another record year, even surpassing the gains in the red-hot U.S. market, and the housing agency’s leader had to take to Twitter to say they’d gotten it wrong, shortly before being replaced.

Today, the buying, selling and building of homes in Canada takes up a larger share of the economy than it does in any other developed country, according to the Bank of International Settlements. It also soaks up a larger share of investment capital than in any of Canada’s peers.

Canadians’ mortgages have helped create one of the largest consumer debt piles in the world, and its financial system’s exposure to those loans is twice that of the U.S. With prices already at record levels, Canada’s housing market kicked off 2021 by going into overdrive, posting annual gains of 30% in many communities across the country.

GUEST: Ari Altstedter, Reporter with Bloomberg News

Ontario’s current Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Steve Clark, has become one of the most prominent figures in Premier Doug Ford’s cabinet, partly through his use of previously obscure powers to approve development projects across the province while overriding planning and environmental rules.

They are known as ministerial zoning orders, or MZOs. Mr. Clark says he has issued them, and tabled legislation to make them even more powerful, to speed up sluggish local planning and spur economic growth, while accelerating the building of affordable housing and new long-term care beds. Opposition critics charge he is granting favours to developers who are generous Progressive Conservative donors.

Now, some of the 40 MZOs he has issued since 2019 – many more than his Liberal predecessors issued in an entire decade – are producing political headaches and legal fights. 

GUEST: David Crombie, former federal cabinet minister & former chair of the Greenbelt Council

The Bill Kelly Show Podcast:

Factual or disinformation? We fact check a group of doctors refuting the COVID-19 pandemic.

GUEST: Marcus Kolga, Senior Fellow with the Macdonald-Laurier Centre for Advancing Canada’s Interests Abroad

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The key member of the provincial COVID-19 Science Advisory Table and the Ontario Hospital AssociatFact Checking ion (OHA) are warning the province has entered the third wave of the coronavirus pandemic, citing a sharp increase in new variant-of-concern (VOC) cases and rising admissions to intensive care units.

GUEST: Dr. Peter Juni (You-nee), Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the University of Toronto and the Director of Ontario’s Science Advisory Table

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Most Ontarians are concerned about Canada’s COVID-19 vaccination rates compared with other countries, a new poll suggests.

The Campaign Research survey for the Toronto Star found 51 per cent of respondents give this country “poor” marks for its rollout of vaccines.

About one-third — 29 per cent — said it was “fair” while 12 per cent said it was “good” and two per cent said it was “excellent” with seven per cent having no opinion.

GUEST: Nick Kouvalis, Principal at Campaign Research

What is the role of family physicians during the pandemic and vaccine rollout?

GUEST: Dr. Jason Profetto, Family Physician, Chair of Clinical Skills and Assistant Clinical Professor with McMaster University’s Undergraduate Medical Program