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The United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) released a report on 7 March criticizing Canada for its failure to protect the economic, cultural and social rights of its most vulnerable citizens.

Affordable housing activists are commending the UN for bringing to light Canadian negligence in providing housing to its large homeless communities.

In the 1990s the Canadian government withdrew significant investment in affordable housing, exacerbating an already simmering problem. In conjunction with falling wages and disinvestment in pensions and social welfare programs, Canada’s homeless rate has spiked over the past two decades.

A 2014 report entitled the State of Homeless in Canada found that on any given night approximately 35,000 Canadians are homeless—anywhere between 13,000 and 33,000 are chronically homeless. The Canadian Observatory on Homelessness and Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness released the report.

The CESCR findings chastised the nation for its inability to implement the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to protect the rights of the homeless or those in poverty. Signed into law in 1982 “the Charter,” as it is referred to as, serves as a bill of rights for all Canadian citizens. It guarantees the political and civil rights of Canadian citizens and residents.

But criticisms from the CESCR report suggest the state need to take a human rights-based approach to poverty, using the entirety of its resources to combat marginalization of its vulnerable citizens. The report further found that Canada does have the “fiscal and judicial systems in place” to suitably protect its people, and therefore urged it to use any and all mechanisms at its disposal.

Homelessness costs Canada $7 billion annually in emergency shelters, social services, health care and corrections. But over the past 25 years annual national investment in housing has decreased by some 46%. The federal government decreased its spending on low-income housing from $115 to $60 during the same period, according to the State of Homeless report.

Canada Without Poverty (CWP), a non-profit that seeks to end poverty in Canada, welcomed the UNCESCR findings in a press release. President of CWP Harriett McLachlan stated, "The Committee has made it clear to Canada that significant work must be done if we want to fulfill our human rights obligations. For the Trudeau government to be serious about being an international human rights leader, this is the place to start -- by respecting and effectively implementing ESC rights. As it stands now, close to 5 million people living in poverty in Canada have no means to access justice and to protect their rights."

The Canadian government has no structured anti-poverty plan, instead relying on non-profits and charity organizations to deal the issue. CWP called for the development of such a strategy and called on newly elected Liberal prime minister Justin Trudeau to implement it immediately.

Mark Cripps, a spokesman for the Ontario Housing Minister Ted McMeekin’s told Toronto-based news outlet The Star that the government is “committed to building a strong housing and homelessness-prevention system that meets the needs of Ontarians.”

“We look forward to working with the federal government and other provinces and territories in developing a national housing strategy that is flexible enough to address local priorities,” added Cripps.

However, rights groups are skeptical of a government that has actively decreased protections for the homeless and access to the judicial system for Canadians.

CWP's Executive Director Leilani Farha outlined specific measures for reconciliation, in stark contrast to the government’s wavering promises.

"The message from the CESCR is clear, Canada must do more protect human rights at home. The court system must be opened to protect the most vulnerable, and this will mean broadening the interpretation of the Charter to ensure the justiciability of ESC rights under Canadian law,” Farha said in the CWP press release.

“The government needs to understand that rights like adequate housing, food and health are not to be taken lightly. The Committee is clear: national strategies must be developed to address poverty and firmly rooted in human rights."