Conservative plan to tackle tent cities looks like ‘political theatre,’ experts say

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre holds a rally in Vaughan, Ont., on Tuesday, March 24, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

HAMILTON — Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said Wednesday he would give police more power to dismantle tent cities, but critics said his plan signals the Conservatives want to take a punitive approach to homelessness.

During a policy announcement in Hamilton, Ont., Poilievre blamed Liberal policies, including funding for safer supply programs, for the increase in the number of homeless encampments across Canada.

“For those trapped in these camps, our brothers, our sisters, our friends, our neighbours, they are left to suffer in the cold, to overdose, and sometimes to die alone,” he said. “Letting these tent cities spread is not compassion. It is chaos.”

The Conservatives are promising to amend the Criminal Code to allow police to arrest people who are blocking public spaces with tents or temporary shelters.

“No more excuses by politicians claiming they don’t have the powers,” Poilievre said. “No more paralysis from politically correct Liberal politicians who are too afraid to take action.”

Poilievre said police would have the power to criminally charge the occupants of tent encampments. But he added that judges could sentence people charged with illegally occupying a public place and simple possession of illegal drugs to mandatory drug treatment instead of harsher penalties.

“We’re here to give people a way out,” he said.

Supporters gathered in Trenton, N.S., for a rally on Wednesday evening.

Steve Mason said he was at the rally because he has “lost confidence” in the Canadian government and believes Poilievre would bring back a sense of safety to Canadians.

“We need the violence off the streets. We need people to be able to afford food and shelter, and be able to walk around freely and safely,” he said.

Mason said he’s in support of the measure Poilievre announced Wednesday that would give police more power to dismantle homeless encampments.

“I think police are afraid (of taking such action),” he said, adding that people shouldn’t be forced to live in encampments. “In Canada we should be able to walk around with a sense of freedom.”

Estair Van Wagner, an associate professor at the University of Victoria’s law faculty, said the Conservative plan smacks of “political theatre.”

“Where laws are being broken, we have adequate means for the police to step in. So there’s no gap here that they would be filling,” she said. “This is more performative.”

It’s not clear what new powers a change to the Criminal Code would give to police. A Conservative campaign official pointed to a section of the code that covers public disturbances as a possible place for an amendment.

Under section 175 (1), however, it’s already an offence to loiter or obstruct people in a public place.

“Many of the things that are spelled out here are already in our legal system,” said Alexandra Flynn, an associate professor and director of the housing research collaborative at the University of British Columbia. “If people endanger public safety, they can already be arrested.”

Flynn pointed out that police often rely on municipal bylaws to clear out tent cities and said it’s not the federal government’s role to decide what should be done about them. She said there’s a patchwork of approaches to homeless encampments in cities across the country.

Poilievre said he would adopt a “housing-first” model to get people off the streets and into homes, though he provided few details. He also repeated a promise to fund addiction treatment for 50,000 people.

Flynn said that while those commitments are “really positive,” she fears the broader focus of the plan is “more about criminalization than providing housing and treatment.”

Poilievre said public spaces in Canada have “become a breeding ground for addiction, violence, human trafficking and crime.” He has promised already to shut down safe supply sites and give judges the power to order mandatory drug treatment for those struggling with addiction.

He also touted a recent endorsement from the Toronto Police Association, Canada’s largest municipal police union. In a social media post on Tuesday, the union said the Conservatives are the only party “that has maintained a strong position on public safety issues and proactively supported police services.”

Attempts to evict people from tent encampments have faced legal challenges in the past. In January 2023, a judge in Kitchener, Ont., ruled there is a constitutional right to shelter outside when there are no accessible and available indoor spaces.

Van Wagner said she thinks the Conservatives’ plan is meant to signal, in response to such court rulings, “that they would like to support the criminalization and stigmatization of those living in encampments.”

During a press conference in Victoria on Wednesday, Liberal Leader Mark Carney said Poilievre has taken an “American-style approach” to the issue by promising to arrest people instead of addressing “the underlying challenges that are there.”

Speaking in Edmonton on Wednesday, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh also criticized Poilievre’s plan.

“He wants to charge people that are homeless,” he said. “He wants to criminalize people that have nowhere else to live.”

Poilievre made a quick stop at a union hall in downtown Halifax Wednesday afternoon, where he picked up an endorsement from the Halifax chapter of the International Longshoremen’s Association Local 269.

Local president Kevin Piper said Poilievre was getting his union’s support because of help the Conservatives offered after the Liberal government changed the hours of work regulations for port workers in 2022.

Before the rally began Wednesday, an attendee wearing a “Make Canada Great Again” hat was told he had to remove it before entering the event space.

John Stickney, who is from Pictou County and lives in the Halifax area now, drove about an hour and 45 minutes to attend the rally near where he grew up.

Stickney said he was there because the cost of living in Nova Scotia under the Liberal government has made life “miserable.”

“I’m working all the time, with an education, to just pay rent and bills and child support. I have no quality of life under the Liberals. They have brought in too many people without having infrastructure,” he said in an interview while waiting in line to enter the rally. “I want to show the Liberals I’m not going to take it anymore, I can’t take it. I can’t live like this anymore.”

Shelley Armsworthy also made the drive to the Pictou County rally from Halifax because she says she’s “frightened” about the economic impact of another Liberal government.

“The platform of the Liberals is terrifying: $130 billion. It’s like borrowing more money when you already owe, and we just can’t afford it,” Armsworthy said while in the rally line up.

Armsworthy said she wanted to attend Wednesday night’s rally in person to see for herself how many people show up to support the Conservatives.

She said she’s skeptical of recent polls that put the Liberals slightly ahead.

“Hands-on working folks wouldn’t be answering a poll … I think it’s a little bit biased,” she said.

Written by Maura Forrest in Montreal and Nick Murray in Hamilton, with files from Keith Doucette in Halifax and Lyndsay Armstrong in Trenton, N.S.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 23, 2025.