Wawa-news.com Local and Regional News
November 6, 2026
Winnipeg, Manitoba
In an increasingly turbulent world, Canada is determining our future. We have the strength to build, the discipline to deliver, and the values to take care of each other.
Budget 2026 is the next major step of our ambitious, pragmatic, generational plan to make Canadians maîtres chez nous – masters of our destiny – building our sovereignty and giving us the freedom to live our lives as we choose. And being maîtres chez nous begins with a place to call your own.
Canadians always care for each other. The crisis of homelessness that has deepened since the pandemic strikes at the heart of Canadian values of fairness, solidarity, and human dignity. That is why Budget 2026 sets Canada on a path to end homelessness within 10 years. Backed by nearly $30 billion, this is an unprecedented federal initiative to tackle homelessness and ensure all Canadians can live in dignity and community.
Today, the Prime Minister, Mark Carney, was joined by the Premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, and the Mayor of Winnipeg, Scott Gillingham, to announce the first step in delivering that plan: a landmark partnership with Manitoba, backed by over $1 billion in new federal funding. This partnership will help build more than 2,000 new supportive and transitional homes and a new Winnipeg Centre for Mental Health and Addictions.
A national plan built on what works
For decades, governments, communities, and front-line organisations have grappled with homelessness, and their experience has shown what makes the biggest difference.
Homelessness is about more than a roof over one’s head. It is about the help people rely on every day, the stability of a safe and affordable home, and the health care many need, including for mental health and addictions. For too long, these systems have operated apart, and not at the scale this crisis demands. Budget 2026 brings them together around what we have learned works: help, housing, and health.
Help: reaching people early, and staying with them until they find a home
- $6.5 billion to renew and strengthen the Reaching Home Initiative and support for veteran homelessness. This funding supports community-led efforts to prevent homelessness, connect people with shelter and essential services, and help them find employment support and a permanent home. Communities will be expected to provide more consistent and timely data to measure the scale of homelessness and track progress in reducing it.
- $5.5 billion to renew the Canada Housing Benefit to provide direct monthly rental assistance to low-income Canadians, including survivors of gender-based violence, so they can pay their rent, keep their homes, and avoid becoming homeless.
Housing: a safe place to go, from transitional homes to deeply affordable ones
- $10 billion through Build Canada Homes to support the delivery of about 25,000 supportive and transitional homes across Canada. The federal government will fund construction, while provinces and territories fund operations and the services residents need to stay housed.
- This investment will grow as more partners step forward.
Health: care and a home, together under one roof
- $5 billion for a new Integrated Supports Fund, delivered through Build Canada Homes, to build facilities that bring housing, health care, mental health and addictions treatment, and other social services together, with public, private and philanthropic partners. The model builds on the success of Toronto’s Dunn House, where residents’ emergency room visits have been cut in half.
- $2 billion for the Build Communities Strong Fund’s Health Infrastructure Fund to build new community mental health and addictions treatment facilities and refurbish existing ones.
Starting in Winnipeg
Premier Kinew and community and philanthropic partners brought forward a plan to break the cycle of homelessness, and the federal government responded. Under the partnership:
- Up to $800 million in federal funding will support more than 2,000 new supportive and transitional homes for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness. The City and the Province will identify and provide public land, and the Province will operate the homes and provide the supports that come with them.
- Over $200 million in federal funding, the first investment from the new Integrated Supports Fund, will support construction of the Winnipeg Centre for Mental Health and Addictions. The Centre will bring acute and outpatient mental health and addictions care together with permanent housing and coordinated support services: one front door to help, housing, and health. The Province will cover half the cost of construction, operate the Centre, and provide job training and income supports, and philanthropic partners will contribute from construction through operations. The Centre is expected to be fully operational in as soon as three years.
These projects, combined with supportive and transitional housing already committed by Build Canada Homes in partnership with Manitoba, mean up to 2,500 new homes in Winnipeg. Homes with critical supports, for the people who need them most.
An open invitation
The Winnipeg partnership is a model for what can be achieved when governments, communities, and partners come together. We can do this everywhere. The Government of Canada will work with every willing partner.
A home is more than a roof over someone’s head. It is the foundation for good health, personal security, and the opportunity to build a better life. This is what it means to be maîtres chez nous: a sovereign Canada, where we take care of each other, where we create opportunities for all, and where we are free to live our lives as we choose.
- PM Carney launches plan to end homelessness within 10 years in Budget 2026 - November 9, 2026
- PM Carney Carney lance Le Plan pour un Canada - October 30, 2026
- PM Carney launches The Plan for a Stronger Canada - October 30, 2026
