Any time a government fails to deliver on a hallmark program or policy, red flags go up. When that government deliberately refuses to release basic information about its failure, the red flag quickly becomes an air raid siren.
Such was the case Tuesday as the Free Press reported on a worrisome decision to cap support through the Canada-Manitoba Housing Benefit, which provides up to an additional $422 per month for people on Employment and Income Assistance or low-income earners to cover the cost of private rental housing.
The program has been in place since 2020 and was triggered by a $4-billion commitment from Ottawa. This is apparently the first time there was a pause in processing new applications.
MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES
The Canada-Manitoba Housing Benefit was introduced in spring 2023 and enhanced to include victims of gender-based violence earlier this year. Federal Northern Affairs Minister Dan Vandal, minister responsible for Housing, and Manitoba Housing, Addictions and Homelessness Minister Bernadette Smith made the announcement of the enhanced benefit in March 2024.
Questions posed by the Free Press to government cabinet communications and departmental communications failed to provide a meaningful answer about why the program was capped, other than demand for the benefit had grown by “500 per cent.”
Requests to speak to Housing, Addictions and Homelessness Minister Bernadette Smith or Premier Wab Kinew were denied Tuesday. Questions about how much money the NDP committed to the program in the current fiscal year, and how many people currently get the benefit, were unanswered.
The completely unsatisfying response from communicators, and the refusal to provide a government representative on the record to answer questions, raises two important concerns.
First, is the pause on this program evidence the Kinew government has spent itself into a fiscal corner, forcing it to cut some programs that one would expect to be sacrosanct for a New Democratic government that promised to end homelessness?
Or second, is this a government that still doesn’t have the capacity to respond quickly to a political wildfire? The truth may involve elements of both questions.
Only after our story was published was the Free Press told the program has had unprecedented demand following the former PC government’s decision to expand eligibility and increase payments.
Under the expanded criteria and more generous benefits announced in June 2023, enrolment in the program exploded. A year ago, 932 people were enrolled; by the end of August 2024, the program had skyrocketed to more than 3,000 recipients.
That helps us understand why the key program has run out of money. It does not explain why the government has not added money to it.
Part of the answer may have been provided by Kinew, who confirmed in early September that his government is — not even a year into its mandate — facing a fiscal crunch. Kinew told The Canadian Press he is working to “articulate a path to balance” that will involve some measure of austerity. Kinew would not say which programs would be affected.
However, in the same story, Kinew confirmed he is strongly considering extending the gasoline tax holiday he delivered in January. That tax cut alone could result in a loss of more than $340 million in revenue, most of it falling in the 2024-25 fiscal year that ends next March.
The vagaries of that statement do not serve Kinew or his government well when there is daily anecdotal evidence the NDP has or is close to running out of money this fiscal year.
On the same day the Free Press reported the cap for the rent benefit, there was a compelling story about how a three-year-old girl with severe tooth decay has had her dental surgery cancelled twice.
These stories could be unrelated. However, when viewed together — an extension of the gas-tax holiday, a cap on an important rent-assist benefit and a shortage of capacity for dental surgeries — we get a picture of a government at risk of failing to deliver on key programs, or failing to find a path to balance — or both.
What if this isn’t about fiscal capacity? What if this is a story about a government that is struggling to get ahead of key stories as they unfold? The questionable efforts to respond to basic questions about the rent-assist program suggest the NDP is still in the early stages of building an internal communications and issues-management infrastructure.
All new governments go through growing pains as they try to build systems to identify potential hot spots and craft communications and policy solutions. The NDP was elected with opposition-level staff who had opposition-appropriate skills. Although Kinew graduated from opposition to government with several beautiful minds, the sheer scope of government means slowly accumulating more talent with instincts to see trouble coming and forge solutions.
Kinew really should have built this infrastructure: namely, the inability to flag an issue of high political concern and respond urgently to prevent it from being seen as a bigger problem.
In this instance, a couple of seemingly disconnected stories, combined with comments from the premier, have produced the whiff of a bigger problem.
It could be this government doesn’t have enough people. Or, it could be it doesn’t have the right people in place to manage political issues and communications.
Either way, Kinew faces a watershed moment. Perhaps this was all bad timing, a confluence of stories that give off the perception of incompetence. But the longer you live with a perception like that, the greater the chance people will start to believe it’s the reality.
dan.lett@winnipegfreepress.com
Dan Lett
Columnist
Dan Lett is a columnist for the Free Press, providing opinion and commentary on politics in Winnipeg and beyond. Born and raised in Toronto, Dan joined the Free Press in 1986. Read more about Dan.
Dan’s columns are built on facts and reactions, but offer his personal views through arguments and analysis. The Free Press’ editing team reviews Dan’s columns before they are posted online or published in print — part of the our tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
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