Victoria rally gets heated as protesters try to force their way into housing meeting

A protest rally in Victoria got heated as dozens of protesters tried to force their way into a meeting with housing ministers from across the country.

About 30 housing advocates shouting "Christy's cuts are class war!" tried to push past police officers and staff at the Grand Pacific Hotel.

They're demanding the federal government spend more than$10 billion annually to build 77,000housing units peryear in Canada.

"The message we'regettingfrom the government is that they'reinterestedin posturing around housingbut not willing to take people off the street," saidIvan Drurywiththe Alliance Against Displacement, who led the group's attempt to bust into the hotel.

• IN DEPTH |Victoria homeless camp a symptom of B.C.'s broken housing market

Before therally,Druryand his fellow advocates got a surprisevisit fromFederal Housing Minister Jean-Yves Duclos, who stepped out of the hotel tomet withthe group.

"We are working across the housing spectrum, which goes from homelessness to market housing, and we have a huge interest in social housing," Duclos said to the group.

In the 2016 budget, the federal government pledged $2.3 billion for affordable housing including a $150-million investment announced last Sunday, focused on B.C.

• ANALYSIS |Federal housing solutions: lots of talk, not much action

Inside the hotel, B.C. Housing Minister Rich Coleman was also calling on the federal government for help with the province's housing crisis.

But he said provincial housing ministers "have turned a page" on a national housing strategyand saw more support from the federal government to build housing.

Duclos said the government is trying to address a wide range of housing problems, from $1 million homes to social housing.

He saidhe and his provincial and territorial counterparts are working toward the country's first national housing strategy in four decades.

"No one government can address those housing needs alone," he said. "Today is a demonstration that we are there to listen and address the housing needs that Canadians have frankly expressed over the last few months and last few years."

With files from The Canadian Press