The managers of social housing of the Far North Quebec have just obtained judgments ordering the expulsion of a hundred bad payers, at the risk of pushing many Inuit on the street.
What to know
- In the far north of Quebec, 98 % of the population lies in social housing;
- The organization that manages these homes has just obtained expulsion judgments against a hundred families for non-payment of rent;
- Some are worried about seeing ousted tenants fail in the streets of Montreal or in other already overcrowded accommodation.
The Nunavik Housing Office (OHN) manages almost all housing in the region, the vast majority of them inits: 98 % of the 14,000 inhabitants of the region live there. Isolation results in prohibitive construction costs which virtually prevent any private house from seeing the light of day. Being expelled from social housing therefore condemns to live or go into exile to the south.
Since last spring, the OHN has obtained 99 expulsion judgments, almost always rendered in the absence of the tenants. This is the most important wave since 2018.
“Our mission is really not to oust people,” says Lupine Daignault, director general of the organization, in an interview with The press.
The judgments obtained from the administrative court of housing ordered the tenants to leave their homes. But the boss of the Ohn assures that only a small number of tenants are really ousted by a bailiff: from 5 to 10 per year in the last years.
We try to work with [les locataires] To try to ensure that they demonstrate a will – or minimum efforts – to improve their situation.
LUPIN DAIGNAULT, Director General of OHN
“As soon as we receive a return from people, that they demonstrate a minimum will, they are removed from the list of evictions” made by a bailiff.
Tenants targeted by eviction judgments often owe thousands of dollars and have sometimes failed to pay their rent for several years. “We really treat extreme cases,” pleads Mr. Daignault. “Having people who do not want to collaborate, who do not pay, who do not maintain their homes and who even destroy their homes while there are 800 people [inscrites sur la liste d’attente pour un logement] […] We try to make choices. »»
“An irresponsible social policy”
For Martin Gallié, professor of housing law at the University of Quebec in Montreal, these evictions are unacceptable.
“It is an absolutely catastrophic social policy,” he deplores in a telephone interview. “In the name of the responsibility of the natives who supposedly should pay, we try to completely obscure the responsibility of the Quebec government which houses people in completely overcrowded, unsanitary accommodation and in completely dramatic conditions. »»
Mr. Gallié underlines that the Inuit are very widely overrepresented among the indigenous population of Montreal.
“The government is responsible for ensuring that people have a rehousing solution before expelling,” he continues. “It is really an irresponsible social policy. »»
The law professor also denounces the work of the administrative housing court (Tal, ex-housing repretion), which makes decisions of expulsion to the chain, almost always in the absence of the Inuit tenants.
The judgments published also indicate that the tenants of Nunavik never seem to appeal against their landlord, the Ohn.
“The administrative court of housing intends to the requests presented to it taking into account the availability of the parties,” said Denis Miron, head of TAL communications.
In 2018, The press reported that an inuit woman suffering from deafness had killed Kuujjuaq, a few weeks after being expelled from her accommodation. Her farewell letter “said that her gesture was voluntary, that she felt liked anyone and that she had nowhere to go,” said Coroner Éric Lépine the following year. Mme Papak was 55 years old. She owed $ 55,000 in unpaid rent.
Two bedrooms for 12 people
The shortage of housing in Nunavik has been a well -known problem for a long time. A report dating from last winter indicates that there is a lack of approximately 1040 dwellings to properly house the entire current population of Nunavik. “Since 2021, the deficit has increased by 16 %,” said the firm Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton in a document produced at the request of the OHN. “Note that the 500 people aged 16 to 17 are not taken into account in the needs of the units mentioned above. »»
The report mentions that two -room accommodation sometimes houses 8, 9, 10, or even 12 people in the region.
The Ohn manages some 4,000 dwellings in total for a population of 14,000 inhabitants in Nunavik.
This overcrowding is cited as an important factor to explain the fact that Nunavik is one of the only regions in the West where tuberculosis – eradicated elsewhere – is still very present.
Last month, the mayors of Nunavik also called Quebec to declare the state of emergency before a significant increase in the number of patients: 40 since the start of 2025.
“The Inuit of Nunavik are not treated as equal citizens in the Quebec health system,” said mayors.
