NDP leadership hopeful talks about Canada's housing crisis in Sudbury, Ont.

Federal NDP leadership hopeful Heather McPherson says the party needs to focus on people’s basic needs to win back voters.

“What we need to do is start talking to people about the issues that are most important to them right now,” said McPherson, who was in Sudbury, Ont., on Monday, where she met with local housing advocates.

“And for Canadians across the country it is housing, it is jobs. It is making sure that young people can access employment and it is the cost of living.”

The NDP currently has seven members of Parliament across Canada and none of them are in northern Ontario, where the party once held nearly ever seat.

McPherson is one of five people running to lead the party, which will choose a new leader in March.

At the meeting in Sudbury, housing advocates described a dire situation with growing numbers of people living on the streets and a lack of financial resources needed to address the situation.

Raymond Landry, co-ordinator for Sudbury’s Homelessness Network, said affordable public housing is nearly impossible to come by in a timely fashion.

“We have some persons who have been waiting over two years, supported by the Homelessness Network in their application for public housing,” he said.

“And so it’s not a practical thought to think that you’ll get into public housing anytime soon if you’re suddenly homeless.”

The city maintains what it calls a by-name list of people who are actively homeless. Over the last year, an average of 298 people have been on the list during any given month.

Landry said around 34 of those people are seniors and there’s also a growing number of teenagers living on Sudbury’s streets.

“Presently in Sudbury, we’re seeing a level of seniors growing on the streets because of affordability issues,” he said.

Landry noted that programs such as Ontario Works and the Ontario Disability Support Program fall short of meeting covering market rent for bachelor apartments in Sudbury.

Evie Ali, the executive director of the Go-Give Project, an organization that helps people in Sudbury with substance use disorders, said many charitable organizations are struggling to keep up with the need in the community.

Ali said many of her employees are on short-term contracts since they are dependent on federal, provincial and municipal funding programs.

“That means inconsistent help for the individuals who are actually using the services,” she said.

“All of the services are over-capacity. And this is kind of like a cyclical loophole that we’re all stuck in. You know, find funding, obtain funding, use the funding and then hope more comes.”