Manitoba experiencing growth spurt and we’re a long way from ready

Opinion

You may have missed it, but Manitoba quietly hit a milestone recently.

According to Statistics Canada, the province’s population surpassed 1.5 million people earlier this year. Not that anyone noticed. No ribbon cuttings. No speeches at the legislature. Not even a government news release.

Manitoba’s population hit 1,504,023 on Jan. 1. By April 1, the province tacked on another 3,307 people. From April 1, 2024 to April 1, 2025, Manitoba’s population grew by 21,375 people, or 1.44 per cent. It’s the fifth-largest growth rate since 1973, according to the Manitoba Bureau of Statistics.

Manitoba even attracted more people from other provinces than it lost in the first quarter of 2025 — the first time that’s happened since 2004.

But hitting 1.5 million isn’t just about bragging rights or demographic trivia. It’s a turning point. Because growing by tens of thousands of people every year comes with consequences. And the big question is: are we ready for it?

Right now, the answer is no.

Let’s start with the most obvious problem: housing. Ask anyone under 40 trying to buy a home in Winnipeg or Brandon, or a newcomer looking for rental space, and they’ll tell you the housing crunch is real. Rents are up, vacancy rates are low, and home prices are climbing faster than incomes.

Premier Wab Kinew’s government has promised to build more affordable housing, and there are some encouraging signs. But the pace of construction still lags behind demand.

Immigration — the biggest driver of our population growth — is outpacing our ability to house people affordably. And while high immigration helps the labour market and tax base, it also increases pressure on housing stock, especially in Winnipeg where most new arrivals settle.

Then there’s health care. We already have one of the worst physician shortages in the country. Emergency room overcrowding is the worst it’s been in recent history and wait times for orthopedic, cataract and other surgeries continue to grow.

More people means more demand for primary care, diagnostics and surgeries — services health authorities are already struggling to deliver. Until the province finds a way to recruit and retain more doctors, nurses and health professionals, Manitoba’s growing population will only deepen those cracks.

Education is another area where population growth is stretching capacity. Portable classrooms are becoming permanent fixtures and school divisions are scrambling to find land and funding for new schools.

In rural Manitoba, growth in places such as Niverville and Winkler means schools are filling up fast.

At the same time, First Nations communities still face persistent underfunding and infrastructure deficits. Government is playing catch-up in too many places at once.

Then there’s justice and public safety.

Adult inmate counts in Manitoba increased by more than 12 per cent in 2022-23. Worse, incarceration rates have outpaced population growth for the past decade. As Manitoba’s population grows, so too does the strain on the justice system.

Policing resources in Winnipeg and other urban centres are also stretched thin, particularly in dealing with mental-health crises, addiction-related crime, and public safety in the downtown core. The root causes — poverty, trauma, homelessness — aren’t going away. If anything, they’re intensifying. Meanwhile, the Winnipeg police complement is smaller today than it was a decade ago.

Manitoba’s population boom is also putting new demands on infrastructure — roads, water and transit. Brandon, Portage la Prairie and Steinbach are growing fast, but they’re still waiting on key infrastructure upgrades. Even in Winnipeg, the pace of investment in things such as rapid transit or road renewal hasn’t kept up with the population curve.

That doesn’t mean population growth is a bad thing. Far from it. Growth brings opportunity — more economic activity, more innovation, a bigger tax base. It’s a sign that people want to come here and build a future.

But growth without planning is a recipe for disaster. It’s not enough to simply welcome people in — we need to make sure the infrastructure and services are there to support them. And that requires forward-thinking policy, not just reactionary measures.

It also means the province can’t just rely on Ottawa to fix everything. While federal immigration targets drive much of the population growth, it’s provincial governments — and by extension, municipalities — that have to deliver the services. Ottawa doesn’t build your local ER or pave your street.

The NDP government has talked a lot about restoring public services. That’s admirable. But restoring what we had in the past won’t be enough. Manitoba has to plan for what’s coming: a province that will likely hit 1.6 million people within a few short years.

What’s needed is a comprehensive provincial growth strategy — not just immigration plans or housing announcements in isolation, but a co-ordinated vision for where Manitoba is headed and how we get there.

That means aligning immigration targets with housing starts, investing in training for health professionals and tradespeople, and rethinking how we deliver education and justice in a rapidly changing province.

Reaching 1.5 million is a milestone. But it’s not a finish line. It’s the start of a new chapter in Manitoba’s history. And whether that chapter is a story of prosperity or strain depends entirely on how our leaders respond now.

tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca

The numbers are clear. The question is whether the vision will follow.