One reason for the long waiting list is the massive affordable housing deficit caused by federal and provincial governments cutting funding in the 1970s and 1980s. As the Minister responsible for the New Brunswick Housing Corporation admitted, between the 1970s and the 2020s no new public housing was built in New Brunswick. Had the federal government not cut funding, hundreds of thousands more affordable housing units would have been built in Canada and many people who are currently struggling or homeless would have a decent place to live.