Remember the deaths of three people in a low cost rooming house in Van East?
http://www.metronews.ca/vancouver/local/article/739005–deadly-blaze-raises-questions
As justly pointed out in this article, the sad occurring raises important questions about social justice. Come on! Canada is one of the richest nations in the world. More. Vancouver is the richest province of Canada and always makes the tops of the lists for the best places to live on earth!
How is it then that three people have died for lack of decent housing? Isn’t shelter a basic human right? How is it that in a city where astronomic amount of money is put towards bikes lanes_a good thing in itself_ or towarda the embellishment of a stadium, affordable, safe housing is barely existent.
Entertainment put before survival. How strange! And yet we are in a country for which human rights are sooo important!
True, but it’s a sad reality that if that house had been rebuilt to todays standards, those people probably would not have been able to afford living there. So then if all the dumpy apartments and houses in the lower mainland are ripped down and rebuilt as what some may say is “affordable”, the people who currently aren’t poor enough to become homeless, but not rich enough to afford the new houses then… become homeless.
We can’t give them free housing and the people who own the property need to make money too so.. it’s not an easy solution.
Jill, your point makes sense. Nothing really is easy to implement, especially in a capitalist system with very questionable basis. Yes you’re probably right stressing the problematic situation of the people concerned by those lousy housings.
What I was_unclearly_ blaming was the government action. In a city that has the economic means to implement structure of secondary importance_as compared to housing_ the government could _should?_work harder to ensure a minimum standard for housing. I am talking about subsidized housing from the government_ not about individual home owners. If the government took stronger action, people in the precarious situation you describe could have access to better housing and would not have to choose between quality_which in my understanding does not necessarily mean new_ and affordability.
Can you believe that in less ‘evolved’ _non capitalist_ times, everyone actually owned a house!
I hope I’m making sense.