Immigrants and Access to Housing: How Welcome are Newcomers to Canada?
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A premise of this research is that ethnicity, ‘race,’ class and gender do matter in terms of access to the basic necessities and to the normal rewards available in society. The task of the researcher is to find out to what extent and in what way these factors manifest themselves as barriers to full, normal incorporation into society. An immigrant requires access to adequate housing, education, employment and income in order to settle and become a productive member of society. If there are barriers to access in any of these key necessities of daily life, the settlement process is not smooth or fair and differential incorporation is the result. Based on the preliminary findings of the housing new Canadians research project specific barriers to housing in Toronto have been identified. The housing system, like any other set of markets and institutions, apportions resources and opportunities selectively. The formal criteria for allocating housing resources include ability-to-pay (for market housing) and various definitions of need (in social housing). There are also a variety of informal criteria affecting the allocation of housing resources. The resulting barriers logically fall into two categories, primary and secondary. Primary barriers are those resulting from the social construction and the social use of certain characteristics of a person’s profile that are extremely difficult, if not impossible, to change. These are: (1) skin colour (‘race’), (2) ethnicity/culture/religion, and (3) gender. Secondary barriers are characteristics of a person’s profile which can be changed, and often do change, over time. These are: (1) level of income, (2) source of income, (3) knowledge of the housing system, (4) language/accent, (5) household type and size, (6) knowledge of institutions and culture, and (7) experience with the dominant institutions and culture. This research has identified the existence of at least eleven barriers that affect access to housing for recent immigrants in the Toronto area. Some barriers are forms of illegal discrimination; others are not. Though these research results are preliminary there are numerous barriers to equal access to housing opportunities in Toronto, in both private market housing and in social housing. Negative stereotypes, prejudice and ethnocentrism are common enough to affect the housing outcomes of many. There is unfavourable differential treatment of some groups of people in access to housing on irrelevant grounds. There are also other forms of barriers to housing access which the provision of adequate immigrant advisory and support services can address. The net effect of all these barriers, however, is the disadvantaging of some groups in their access to housing and, over the life course, in their housing trajectory.
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