LANDMARK COURT DECISION COULD CHANGE EVERYTHING FOR HOW CANADA ADDRESSES HOMELESSNESS
For the first time in nearly 25 years, a Canadian court has extended new constitutional protections—this time for the equality rights of people experiencing homelessness—marking one of the most significant advances in law for people experiencing homelessness in a generation.
OTTAWA (May 22, 2026): In a landmark decision out of Waterloo, an Ontario Superior Court judge has ruled that people experiencing homelessness have the same Charter protections against discrimination under section 15 as people who face discrimination based on their race, disability, or religion.
This ruling recognizes homelessness as an “analogous ground” of discrimination, meaning that homelessness is a protected ground, and that all levels of governments can now be held accountable in the courts for unfair treatment and lack of proactive measures.
Justice Gibson, in his decision on behalf of the Ontario Superior Court, writes: “The homeless are not Other. They are Us. They are rights bearers no less entitled than any other Canadian citizens to the full benefit and protection of the Charter.”
This decision captures how people experiencing homelessness are stigmatized, marginalized, and excluded from decisions affecting their lives—and how the discrimination they face intersects with the colonization of Indigenous Peoples, violence against women and gender-diverse persons, and the systemic abandonment of programs and supports needed by persons with disabilities.
What this means in practice
If upheld, this decision could mean that anti-camping bylaws, police sweeps of encampments, denial of services when people experiencing homelessness have nowhere else to go, are now far more open to legal challenge.
More importantly, this decision could mean that governments must take meaningful, proactive steps to ensure that people experiencing homelessness have access to safe and adequate housing and supports—and that courts can step in when they don’t.
Providing safe alternative shelter and setting real targets and timelines to address homelessness will no longer be optional. Doing nothing to address homelessness—and taking what Justice Gibson called, an “ostrich approach” can no longer be a legally defensible position.
Why now
This ruling did not happen by accident. It is the direct result of decades of work by advocates, researchers, and organizations across the country who have pushed relentlessly to have the rights of people experiencing homelessness recognized in courtrooms, legislatures, and policy tables. The Court’s willingness to draw on Canada’s international human rights commitments—and to treat the right to housing as a legally enforceable obligation—reflects how profoundly that work has shifted the legal landscape.
What comes next
In Waterloo, encampment residents at 100 Victoria St. North will be allowed to remain until an alternative site with access to essential services and healthcare is provided. But the significance of this ruling extends far beyond one encampment in one city. We expect it to be cited in housing and homelessness cases across the country for years to come.
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QUOTES
“This one of the most important court decisions on homelessness in recent Canadian history. For too long, homelessness has been treated as a policy of inconvenience rather than a human rights crisis. Today, the courts have caught up with what people experiencing homelessness have always known: that they deserve full protection from the law and Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms, just like everyone else. This could change everything.”
– Michèle Biss, Executive Director of the National Right to Housing Network.
“This decision affirms in law what people experiencing homelessness have always known: that they are human beings equal in dignity and rights, and that what has been done to them is a human rights failure, not an inevitability. For too long, Canada has made international commitments to the right to adequate housing while failing to protect that right at home. This ruling begins to close that gap and sends a clear signal that governments can no longer hide behind policy discretion when people’s lives are at stake.”
– Bruce Porter, Steering Committee member of the National Right to Housing Network.
“Canada’s international obligations, as adopted through the National Housing Strategy Act, establish a basic human right to adequate shelter centered in human dignity. These obligations require state actors to treat those experiencing homelessness as right-holders entitled to effective remedies, due process, and genuine and meaningful consultation in any encampment response.”
– Justice Gibson from his ruling on The Regional Municipality of Waterloo v. Named Respondents and Persons Unknown, 2026
BACKGROUND
This case stems from the 2022 case when the Region of Waterloo attempted to evict encampment residents living at 100 Victoria St. North: a regionally-owned vacant lot. In the first ruling of its kind, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice Valente found that this attempt to evict encampment residents violated the rights of the residents under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
As response, the Region of Waterloo asked the court what the Charter requires governments to do. More information on this original case can be found here.
In the May 21, 2026 decision—a key reason that Justice Gibson was able to reach the conclusion that homelessness is a protected ground under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is largely thanks to Canada’s growing body of law and policy recognizing housing as a fundamental human right.
Canada’s National Housing Strategy Act, the work of the Federal Housing Advocate, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing, and community-based organizations in many municipalities across the country that have implemented charters or plans that affirm housing as a fundamental human right (including the Plan to End Chronic Homelessness in Waterloo), were recognized by Justice Gibson as critical components of a response to homelessness that complies with rights to life, security, and equality under the Charter.
The Court also drew extensively on Canada’s international human rights commitments to interpret the scope of Charter rights, including the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which Justice Gibson noted has been adopted into domestic law through the National Housing Strategy Act (Canada’s right to housing legislation, adopted by the federal government in 2019).
This ruling is the direct result of decades of work by advocates, researchers, and organizations across the country who have pushed relentlessly to have the rights to life and equality rights of people experiencing homelessness recognized in every courtroom, legislature, and policy table available to them.
What comes next
In the long term, this ruling creates a new platform from which to demand much more than lawfully protected and serviced encampments. It demands that homelessness be recognized as an unacceptable violation of fundamental rights to life and equality that all orders of governments must address and solve through meaningful engagement with affected communities and as a legally enforceable obligation under both domestic and international law.
This decision has real impact, and we can expect it to be cited in housing and homelessness cases across the country for years to come.
Encampment residents in this case were represented by counsel from the Waterloo Legal Clinic, with interventions by the Mental Health Legal Committee, The Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Aboriginal Legal Services, and the Charter Committee on Poverty Issues/National Right to Housing Network.
QUICK LINKS
For more information, contact:
Jessica Tan
Communications Lead
National Right to Housing Network
Email: jessica@housingrights.ca
Phone: 613-621-4575
