By Tan Mei Xi
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Vancouver East MP Jenny Kwan is clear: Her priority for 2021 is housing, particularly for Canadians at the edge of homelessness or already experiencing homelessness.

Kwan told The Pulse on CFRO that a disproportionately low amount of federal housing funds were allocated to BC in 2020, and that the funds which had been allocated were not being dispersed fast enough. An analysis by the Vancouver Sun showed that as of August 2020, only three per cent of funds allocated to BC through the National Housing Co-Investment Fund, a federal funding stream for lower-income housing, had actually been dispersed in BC.

Kwan also told The PULSE that the vast majority of federal housing funds allocated to BC were in the form of loans for market-rental housing, not grants for social housing.

The MP also insisted on the need to maintain pressure on the federal government to grant Vancouver an exemption to the federal Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, effectively decriminalizing possession of small amounts of illicit substances within the city’s boundaries.