Bob Mackin
Before he cheered Canada to victory over Qatar in a FIFA World Cup match at B.C. Place Stadium on June 18, Prime Minister Mark Carney bailed out the same industry he cautioned on the day he watched the Vancouver Canucks lose Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final in 2011.
Carney was the Bank of Canada governor prior to housing affordability becoming the dominant national issue. He came to Vancouver on June 15, 2011 and delivered an ominous speech called Housing in Canada.
Prime Minister Mark Carney, between FIFA president Gianni Infanino and Diana Fox Carney in B.C. Place Stadium on June 18, 2026 (PMO)
The average selling price in Vancouver was nearly 11 times the average household income, “a multiple similar to those seen in Hong Kong and Sydney.”
“One cannot totally discount the possibility that some pockets of the Canadian housing market are taking on characteristics of financial asset markets, where expectations can dominate underlying forces of supply and demand,” Carney warned. “The risk is that expectations become extrapolative, prompting the classic market emotions of greed and fear — greed among speculators and investors — and fear among households that getting a foot on the property ladder is a now-or-never proposition.”
Nobody from the Office of Premier Christy Clark or Office of Mayor Gregor Robertson attended that lunch. They were getting ready to cheer on the Canucks against the Boston Bruins.
Fast forward 15 years and three days
Robertson had to be there this time. He was Mayor of Vancouver from 2008 to 2018 when the housing bubble grew, thanks to Chinese money.
The 2025-elected Vancouver Fraserview-South Burnaby MP and Housing Minister emceed Carney’s announcement that included a joint federal/B.C. purchase of 2,200 unsold condominiums for conversion to affordable housing beginning in the fall.
The full cost is not disclosed, but we are told it is one part of a $3.2 billion plan. May figures from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation say 4,376 is the number of “completed and unabsorbed” condos.
From the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade’s newsletter.
Rather than the traditional Musqueam, Squamish and/or Tsleil-Waututh land acknowledgement, Robertson gave a tip of the hat to the event host, River District developer Wesgroup.
“Developers are stuck, they don’t want to sell at a loss, they can’t afford to hold those empty units indefinitely,” Carney said, standing beside Premier David Eby. “And the problem is that those empty homes don’t just sit idle, they also disincentivize new construction, unsettle lenders and investors create a housing market that, in effect, feels frozen. Result: too many British Columbians still can’t find the homes that they can afford.”
Poilievre responds
On June 21 at Vancouver International Airport, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre said the program should be cancelled, because it is a “transfer of wealth from have-nots to the have yachts.”
Developers decided to build during a housing bubble and should find ways on their own to sell the inventory by lowering prices. They knew the risk, Poilievre said.
“Mark Carney seems to have a bailout for anyone who’s part of the Liberal club of power brokers, corporate insiders and lobbyists,” Poilievre said. “They all get a bailout.”
Speaking of friends, insiders and lobbyists
Carney was the featured guest when condo marketer Bob Rennie hosted Liberal fundraisers in February 2025 and February 2026.
The latter came the month after Carney went to Beijing and announced a strategic partnership with Communist China.
Attendees included a who’s who of top executives from Vancouver real estate players: Aquilini, Concord Pacific, Holborn, Intergulf, Larco, Mosaic, MST, Nch’kay, Onni, Pacific Reach, Peterson, Polygon, Pinnacle, Reliance, Strand, Sutton Group, Thind, Wall and Westbank
Also the industry’s lobby group, Urban Development Institute, and media-shy Whitecaps owner and real estate investor Greg Kerfoot.
Back in 2014, Rennie famously promoted a $25,000-a-plate luncheon for Robertson’s mayoral re-election campaign. Until 2017, B.C. had no limit on the size of political donations.
The co-organizer of Carney’s 2025 and 2026 visits to Rennie?
The former deputy head of Robertson’s Vision Vancouver civic party, Duncan Wlodarczak.
Wlodarczak is now chief of staff at Onni and chair of the Liberal Party of Canada in B.C.
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