Question Period Note: GROWING THE HOUSING WORKFORCE

What is the Government of Canada doing to help grow the housing workforce? Canada is facing a housing crisis, requiring millions of new homes in the coming years. To meet affordability and demand, the residential construction industry must add 187,300 workers by 2034, factoring in retirements.

Recent CMHC projections confirm a national ~2% decline in home prices in 2025, driven primarily by U.S.–Canada trade tensions, economic uncertainty, and slower population growth. These pressures are prompting both buyers and developers to adopt a “wait‑and‑see” approach.

Despite temporary relief, Canada faces a significant and accelerating construction labour shortages across residential, commercial, industrial, and infrastructure construction, with shortages forecasted to grow 13% annually between 2026 and 2045.

The construction sector overall accounts for over 7% of Canada’s GDP, employing over 1.6 million people in 2024and is made up mostly of small businesses (e.g. 60% of industry firms are micro businesses consisting of fewer than five employees).

The sector’s workforce included 20.2% newcomers in 2025 (lower than the share in the overall labour force at 28.3%) and had a higher representation of Indigenous workers than the overall labour force (4.6% vs 3.4% in 2025).

Canada’s construction labour force is increasingly strained as large‑scale infrastructure and industrial projects draw on the same skilled trades needed for housing; worsening shortages in residential construction where skilled‑trade vacancies have grown by 11% annually since 2017.

The residential construction workforce includes skilled trades occupations, such as approximately 30 Red Seal trades (e.g. bricklayers, carpenters, construction craft workers, electricians, gasfitters, painters and decorators, plumbers, roofers) and other skilled occupations (e.g. framers, draftspersons, door and window installers). However, much of the home building and renovation workforce is not unionized (excluding Quebec and the Greater Toronto Area) and is outside of Canada’s apprenticeship systems, with general labourers and construction trades helpers accounting for approximately 25% of the construction labour force (there are over 250 occupations in this ‘catch all’ classification).

The Government of Canada is rising to the challenge of delivering housing and major infrastructure projects at an unprecedented pace. While this intensifies existing labour market pressures, it also presents a powerful opportunity to rethink how we build, innovate, and respond to the evolving needs of our communities.  

The Government is working to meet Canada’s growing housing demand by investing in a trained workforce ready to build more affordable homes, including prefabricated and modular homes.

The temporary easing of labour pressures in residential construction provides a window for proactive workforce planning, upskilling, and modernization before housing activity rebounds.

This is why the Government is taking action by investing almost $130 million over the next five years into the construction workforce - benefitting approximately 33,000 Canadians. These important investments will support workers across the country, including skilled tradespeople, youth, and underrepresented groups in the industry.

IF PRESSED (on labour shortages in the skilled trades / federal implementation plan that supports housing)

The Government of Canada recognizes the important role skilled trades workers play in building homes, powering communities, constructing major projects, and maintaining infrastructure.

That’s why it is investing in a skilled workforce to support Canada’s Housing Plan and speed up the pace of housing construction, including:

$40.5 million over the next five years in projects across Canada that support trades related to homebuilding, including efforts to get more women and underrepresented groups into the construction industry benefitting approximately 6,000 participants;

$8.6 million over two years to help Canadians explore, and prepare for, careers in the skilled trades. For example, pre-apprentices, including youth and other groups facing barriers to entering the trades, will access vital work experience in the construction industry;

Over $40 million in training ending March 31, 2028 for trades and non-trades workers in green buildings and retrofits benefitting over 9,500 participants; and

$47.2 million to improve Foreign Credential Recognition processes and provide employment supports to over 5,000 international tradespersons, as well as $97 million over five years starting in 2026-2027 to create a Foreign Credential Recognition Action Fund that will support both the construction and health sectors.

Looking forward, as part of Budget 2025, the Government of Canada is investing $81.4M to establish Workforce Alliances. Alliances will bring together employers, training institutions and worker representatives to enable rapid agreement on the challenges their sector faces and the tools to solve them. This may include a potential Housing and Construction Alliance.

In addition, a new Sectoral Workforce Innovation Fund was announced, allocating up to $258.6 million over five years and $50 million ongoing, to support projects that tackle systemic workforce challenges in residential housing and other strategic economic sectors. Projects will focus on identifying and addressing acute and systemic workforce development needs by supporting industry-validated labour market information, workforce tools and resources, and driving stakeholder engagement.

ESDC supports priority mandate 4: “Making housing more affordable by unleashing the power of public-private cooperation, catalysing a modern housing industry, and creating new careers in the skilled trades”, and will work closely with Build Canada Homes on the workforce component of this priority.

ESDC helps the construction sector by providing support to:

Individuals, including young people and newcomers, helping them access training for well paying jobs in construction.

Employers, to attract and retain a skilled and diverse workforce.

The sector more broadly, building workforce planning capacity and creating talent pipelines to meet demand and capitalize on opportunities.

The two largest federal investments that broadly seek to increase the skills and supply of available workers in Canada’s construction industry are:

The Canadian Apprenticeship Strategy (CAS):

Support a trades workforce that is skilled, inclusive, certified, and productive that includes a suite of programs to support skilled trades workers

Labour Market Agreements:

Partner with the provinces and territories to help individuals access training and employment supports, including a new reskilling investment to train 50,000 workers affected by U.S. tariffs and global market shifts.

Other ESDC programs that support the residential construction sector, include: the Indigenous Skills and Employment Training Program, Skills and Partnership Fund, Foreign Credential Recognition (FCR) Program, Temporary Foreign Worker Program, Youth Employment and Skills Strategy, Sectoral Workforce Solutions Program, Future Skills Centre, Skills for Success Program, Community Workforce Development Program, and the Sustainable Jobs Training Fund.

The CAS is essential to a well-coordinated, coherent ESDC-led response to growing a more robust and resilient skilled trades workforce capable of meeting labour market needs of today and tomorrow so the government can deliver on two key priorities: Building One Canadian Economy and Making Housing More Affordable (priorities #2 and #4 of the Prime Minister’s Mandate Letter, May 21, 2025).

Announced in 2019 and implemented in 2022, the CAS includes a suite of apprenticeship supports including the Union Training and Innovation Program, the Skilled Trades Awareness and Readiness (STAR) program, the Apprenticeship Service, and the Women in the Skilled Trades (WST) Initiative.

Budget 2025 announced commitments to support the housing workforce.

$97 million over five years, starting in 2026-2027, for Employment and Social Development Canada to establish the FCR Action Fund and work with the provinces and territories to improve the fairness, transparency, and timeliness of FCR, with a focus on health and construction sectors. This funding will be sourced from existing departmental resources.

$75 million over three years for the Union Training and Innovation Program to support union-based training in the Red Seal trades. This investment will help the newest generation of Canadian builders get the training needed to help Canada build infrastructure and housing.

$81.4 million over five 5 years to create up to six Workforce Alliances, including a Construction and Housing Alliance, that will convene key partners to tackle urgent labour market challenges and coordinate investments in skills development. Alliances will focus on sectors under pressure and those with growth potential to improve labour market conditions and drive sector-led efforts to support workforce needs.

Up to $258.6 million over five years and $50 million ongoing allocated to a new Sectoral Workforce Innovation Fund (SWIF) to invest in industry-led initiatives aimed at solving immediate and systemic issues within the workforce ecosystem, including those affecting the housing sector. The SWIF will serve as a strategic conduit for ESDC to invest in sectors essential to Canada’s economic resilience and growth, while advancing government priorities and strategies such as Canada's Housing Plan.

This builds on Budget 2024 measures on housing workforce development: 

$90 million for the CAS’s Apprenticeship Service to help create placements for apprentices with small and medium-sized employers.

$10 million for the CAS’s Skilled Trades Awareness and Readiness Program to encourage Canadians to explore and prepare for careers in the skilled trades. $50 million over two years, for the FCR Program. At least half of this amount will be to streamline foreign credential recognition in the construction sector to help skilled trades workers build more homes.

“Despite tariffs understandably dominating headlines, housing is still a top-of-mind concern for Canadians. It will be extremely important for the incoming government to build on its commitments to market-rate housing supply and affordability during its most recent term, and to continue to engage with our industry to address the challenges of the home building sector to unlock the door to homeownership and help restore affordability for Canadians.”

• Kevin Lee, CEO, Canadian Home Builders’ Association.

Reference (link): CHBA Congratulates Mark Carney and the Liberal Party of Canada on Its Fourth Mandate - Canadian Home Builders' Association (April 28, 2025)