Despite the federal government’s professed focus on housing, new home construction starts fell by 10 per cent last month, according to data from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC). According to experts, the impact of housing measures recently introduced by the feds, including taking the GST off new rental developments and funnelling millions in funding to municipalities through the Housing Accelerator Fund, has yet to be borne out in the numbers. The latest figures are part of a larger national trend that has seen new builds in decline over the past few months. …Meanwhile, for Frank Clayton, at Toronto Metropolitan University, there are reasons to be encouraged by the data. …“I’ve seen cycles before and when we have interest rates double and triple…, you usually have a bigger impact on housing starts, so I find this quite amazing that they’re holding up as high as they have been.”