The Canadian government announced on Tuesday that it would provide the city with an additional C$97 million ($73.6 million) to address the growing demand for housing. This is in response to the pressing issue of asylum seekers sleeping on the streets of Toronto.
This funding is part of a one-time injection of C$212 million ($160.9 million) aimed at assisting major cities in managing the increasing number of arrivals from the United States and other regions, according to a statement from Immigration Minister Sean Fraser.
While the federal government, led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, takes pride in its record of accepting refugees and asylum seekers, it faces criticism from Toronto, the country’s largest city, for not providing sufficient funding to keep shelters open.
In response to these concerns, Fraser’s statement highlighted that federal authorities had secured over 3,800 hotel rooms across six provinces to offer temporary housing to asylum claimants as of early July.
By the end of 2022, Canada had more than 70,000 pending refugee claims. The number of asylum seekers who entered Canada through irregular border crossings from the United States reached nearly 40,000 last year, which was nine times higher than in 2021 due to COVID-19-related restrictions.
In March, the United States and Canada made changes to a two-decade-old refugee agreement in an effort to reduce the influx across the world’s largest land border. However, the Quebec government has expressed concerns about the strain on its capacity to accommodate people and provide essential services.
