Multiple Facets of Housing Discrimination

1
Multiple Facets of Housing Discrimination

• Sutama Ghosh
• York University

2
Housing Experiences of Immigrants and Refugees in
Toronto

• Newcomers struggle for affordable, adequate and
  suitable housing
• Discrimination
• Type Institutional and Systemic
• Discrimination along Racial, linguistic, class
  (income and source of income), and culture
• Real Perceived
• Whites (i.e., the Charter groups) discriminate
  against Coloured people (i.e., the
  immigrants/refugees from non European countries)
• Who Discriminates?

3
Housing Discrimination
Immigration Agencies
4
The Case Study

• We are Not All the Same
• The Differential Migration, Settlement Patterns,
  and Housing Trajectories of Indian Bengalis and
  Bangladeshis
• in Toronto
• --------------------------------------------------
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• Research Methods
• Primary data
• 16 key informant interviews through purposive
  sampling
• 60 semi-structured interviews with households in
  face to face situations. Households were selected
  through a reputational sampling method
• Secondary data (e.g., census, LIDS)

5
Migration When did the Indian Bengalis come to
Canada?
6
Indian Bengali Respondents at the Time of Arrival

• Young, highly educated, urban backgrounds
• Engaged in white collar jobs in India IT
  professionals
• Small households
• 19 out of 30 households came to Canada through an
  immigration agency
• Most (17 out of 3089) started their housing
  career by living in a guest house arranged by
  the immigration agency

7
Why Use the Services of the Immigration Agency?

• They told us that we would not be able to rent
  an apartment by ourselvesso, we should stay with
  them (Mrs. A. P. 2003)

8
The Guest House

• Arranged by the agency often consisted of a
  three-bedroom rental apartment in a high-rise
  building
• The living room, kitchen and bathrooms were
  shared. Each household had its own bedroom
• For this accommodation (i.e., just one room in a
  shared apartment), the agency charged each
  household between 650 and 800 -- close to the
  cost of a one-bedroom apartment in Toronto

9
Exploitation

• The immigration agency painted all these rosy
  picturesyou dont worry, just make the payments
  and we will do everything. What we found? Just
  devastating, just devastatingit was not a
  guesthouse, you know, it was a buildingwe were
  to share the apartment with two other families
  (Mr. D. B. 2003)
• They meaning the building management did
  nothing for the upkeep, the apartment was really
  dirty, there were cockroaches everywhere, bad
  plumbing (Mr. S. Dn. 2003)
• You know, when we asked the agency to put us in
  another apartment buildingthey saidpay an
  additional 800 for the rest of the timealready
  half the month had passed, so I told him meaning
  husband we should simply bite the bullet and try
  to get out of there as soon as possible (Mrs. S.
  B. 2003)
• Now we know that we were really cheated when we
  camethey immigration agent took advantage of
  our ignorance (Mrs. A. B. 2003)

10
Conclusions

• Need to recognize housing careers begin before
  the immigrants actually arrive in Canada
• Discrimination is not binarywhite vs
  colouredit involves multiple actors, at
  various stages of the housing careers
• Immigrant institutions may facilitate
  settlements, but these can be exploitative as well