Manitoba Committee Hansard — 16 July 1980 (Statutory Regulations and Orders Committee, Sitting 2, 31st Legislature, 4th Session)

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Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

ISSN 0542-5492 Fourth Session - Thirty-First Legislature of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba STANDING COMMITTEE ON STATUTORY REGULATIONS AND ORDERS 29 Elizabeth 11 Published under the authority of The Honourable Harry E. Graham Speaker · WEDNESDAY, 16 JULY, 1980,2:00 p.m. Printed by The Office of The Queen's Printer, Province of Manitoba

MANITOBA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY Thirty - First Legislature Members, Constituencies and Political Affiliation Name ADAM, A. R. (Pete) ANDERSON,Bob BANMAN, Hon. Robert (Bob) BARROW, Tom SLAKE, David BOSTROM, Harvey BOYCE, J. R. (Bud) BROWN, Arnold CHERNIACK, Q.C., Saul CORRIN, Brian COSENS, Hon. Keith A. COWAN,Jay CRAIK, Hon. Donald W. DESJARDINS, Laurent L. DOERN, Russell DOMINO, Len DOWNEY, Hon. Jim DRIEDGER, Albert EINARSON, Henry J. ENNS, Hon. Harry J. EVANS, Leonard S. FERGUSON, James R. FILMON, Gary FOX, Peter GALBRAITH, Jim GOURLAY,Ho n. Doug GRAHAM, Hon. Harry E.

GREEN, Q.C., Sidney HANUSCHAK, Ben HYDE, Lloyd G. JENKINS, William JOHNSTON, Hon. J. Frank JORGENSON, Hon. Warner H. KOVNATS, Abe LYON, Hon. Sterling R. MacMASTER,Ho n. Ken MALINOWSKI, Donald McBRYDE, Ronald McGILL, Hon. Edward McGREGOR, Morris McKENZIE, J. Wally MERCIER, Q.C., Hon. Gerald W. J. MILLER, Saul A. MINAKER, Hon. George ORCHARD, Hon. Donald PARASIUK, Wilson PAWLEY, Q.C., Howard PRICE, Hon. Norma RANSOM, Hon. Brian SCHROEDER, Vie SHERMAN, Hon. L. R. (Bud) STEEN, Warren URUSKI, Billie USKIW, Samuel WALDING, D. James WESTBURY, June WILSON, Robert G. Constituency Ste.

Rose Springfield La Verendrye Flin Flon Minnedosa Rupertsland Winnipeg Centre Rhineland St. Johns Wellington Gimli Churchill Aiel St. Boniface Elmwood St. Matthews Arthur Emerson Rock Lake Lakeside Brandon East Gladstone River Heights Kildonan Dauphin Swan River Birtle-Russell lnkster Burrows Portage la Prairie Logan Sturgeon Creek Morris Radisson Charleswood Thompson Point Douglas The Pas Brandon West Virden Roblin Osborne Seven Oaks St. James Pembina Transcona Selkirk Assiniboia Souris-Killarney Rossmere Fort Garry Crescentwood St. George Lac du Bonnet St.

Vital Fort Rouge Wolseley Party NDP PC PC NDP PC NDP NDP PC NDP NDP PC NDP PC NDP NDP PC PC PC PC PC NDP PC PC NDP PC PC PC lnd NDP PC NDP PC PC PC PC PC NDP NDP PC PC PC PC NDP PC PC NDP NDP PC PC NDP PC PC NDP NDP NDP Lib PC

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBL V OF MANITOBA THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON STATUTORY REGUL ATIONS AND ORDERS Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 rime - 2:00 p.m. :HAIRMAN - Mr. Warren Steen (Cr escentwood). BILL NO. 83 -

AN ACT TO AMEND THE LANDLORD AND TENACT ACT AND THE CONDOMINIUM ACT IIR. CHAIRMAN: Comm ittee come to order, please. 'Ve have a quorum. Might I point out to the members 1f the commit tee and to the large number of persons hat are in attendance that the list that I have :urrently shows 73 persons that wish to make epresentation before this comm ittee regarding Bill 13,

An Act to amend The Landlord and Tenant Act md the Condominium Act. I would ask members of he commi ttee, as well as the persons making 1resentations, to stick to the bill as closely as they :an and to have consideration for others that would ike to pres enta ti ons and not to make their 1resentation any longer than they feel they need to, •o that we can try and hear all 73 persons tha t have ndicated, and I'm sure that there will be more 1ersons as the time goes on that might wish to make epresentat ion.

If you can keep the briefs as short as ·ou possibly can, I think we can, in the next few lays, hear as many people as possible. To the members .of the commit tee, I have a list 1efore me and the first person on the list is Mr. Vie >avino. Is he present? Mr. Para siuk. IIR. WILSON PARASIUK (T ransc ona): Mr . ;hairperson, I'd just like it unde rstood that if anyone ;n't here, their names will go to the bottom of the st so that they might get a chance to present at the •nd of the hearings. IIR. CHAIRMAN: By all means. Mr. Savino, would you like to proceed? IIR. VIC SAVINO : Yes.

Go od after noon, Mr . ;hairman, and members of the comm ittee. If I may 1e perm itted to remove my jacket, it's a little warm 1 here. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, it's with some amazement that I tppear here . . . IIR. CHAIRMAN: Could I stop you, sir, and ask you, lo you have a printed copy of your br ief? IIR. SAVINO: No, I don't, Mr. Chairman. I just 3arned yesterday of the matter going to commi ttee tnd I don't have a written submission, but I do have ome material which I shall be tabling during my 1resentation to the comm ittee. Mr.

Chairman, members of the comm ittee, it is iith some amazement that I appear before this ommit tee with the bill that is before you, Bill 83, in :s present form. This bill, of course, as I'm sure you :now, repeals the Rent Control Program in 1 Manitoba, among other thin gs. I intend to addr ess myself to not only the provisions with respect to rent stabili zation in Manitoba, but with other provisions of the bill which in my opinion fundamentally undermine the rights of tenants. When this bill first came out, I had a very close look at it and sketched out about 14 pages of notes which I will be referring to.

I would like to initially refer to the last paragraph of those notes which were written in the last week of June.

At that time I observed in looking at the bill and the Cons ervative policy in housing and rent controls generally, and concluded that when one considers the th ree full Conservative strokes of the abolition of rent controls, the abolition of public housing initiatives and the recognition of the supreme right of lando wners to convert rental units into condominiums, one has to ask oneself where low income people are going to live, and my observation at that time was perhaps the next Tory initiative will be to provide rail or bus fare to Alberta or British Columbia.

To my amazement, I didn't two weeks ago how prophetic that statement was. As I understand it, the Minister has now introduced amendments to the legislation which will permit the payment of one month's rent to tenants who don't like the rent incr ease and can be found by the Director of Arbitr ation to have been forced to move because of their rent increase. Presumably, the amount of one month's rent will get them to Calgary, or Edmonton, or wherever they are going. I want to speak about thr ee thin gs toda y essentially.

First of all, why I, myself, as a lawyer and a person who has been involv ed with tenants' concerns for a number of years and vehemently opposed to this bill, and in that portion of my presentation I will deal with the contents of the bill itself. Secon dly, I would like to deal with the issue of why thousands of other Manitobans are opposed to this bill, and at that time I will be refer ring to some petitions and letters which I have received from individuals and groups who are very upset about this legislation.

Thirdly, I hope through the process of this commit tee to suggest to you what the government could do if they really want to accomplish what they state they want to acc omplish, and that is, the removal of rent controls with the protection for tenants from rent gouging. Firstly, on what is wrong with this bill, I have stated before and I will state again before this comm ittee, that this bill is the most savage piece of landlord and tenant legislation to come before any Legislature in many a year.

In 19 70, the government of the New Democratic Party abolished many of the 17 th century notions of landlord and tenant law and brought Manitoba into the 20th century in this field. The amendments proposed by this government are truly reactionary and are an attempt to turn the clock back to some century past in the area of land lord and tenant legislation. There are some minor housekeeping amendments which I don't think anybody has objection to, such as

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 changing the subl et fee from 10 to 20, making landlord and tenant legislation extend to mobile home sites and so on. I don't think too many people have much objection to th ose kinds of changes. But the kinds of changes that I find most shocking are the changes that are buried between the lines of this legislation that affect fundamental economic rights as well as fundamental tenants' rights, as well as the right of a person to possession of his or her home. For example,

Section 24 of Bill 83 repeals Subs ection 11 3(5) of The Landlord and Tenant Act and replaes it. Under the present legislation,

Section 11 3(4) provides protection from eviction for famil ies with school children during the school year, with only two exceptions. One is when the tenant is in arrears in rent, and the other is when the tenant is in serious breach of the tenancy agreement. For xample, being a noise or a nuisance to other tenants. Wit h the amendm ent which th e government proposes in this bill, a family can be evicted during the school year for the reasons I have already outlined , and also, if the landlord wants to turn your apartment into a condominium or if you are renting a mobile home site and the landlord wants to use your site for something other than a mobile home.

Section 11 3 as it now is provides this protection, except in circumstances where the tenant is clearly at fault. This amendment recogn izes the supreme right of property, which presumably is part of the philosophy of this government, tha t would permit a landlord to remove a family with school childr en where he wants to condomini umize, or maybe he wants to turn his trailer site into a shopping centre. The question must be asked, why this change is necessary, and why lando wners could not wait until the end of the school year in circumstances such as this.

I don't know the answer to that question, and I don't know why this provision is in the bill. I have discussed provisions like these with people in the Rentalsman's office and I am informed that these kinds of amendments - and I'll refer to others - are not amendments that are being recommended by the people who are adm inistering the legislation, but the y are amendments tha t are in essence government policy. They have nothing to do with any recommendation that is being made by the Civil Service. I was pleased to learn yesterday that

Section 25 of Bill 83, which repeals

Section 11 4, will be changed before this bill goes to final reading. That, of course, was the discrimination

section where the government was proposing to repeal your right not to be discrimina ted against, not only on human rights grounds covered by The Human Rights Act, but on grounds of membership and attendance group, or association, and I congratula te the government for finally having the gumption to remove that terrible provision that would have set human rights in this province back sev eral years. I would point out in passing, though, that even The Hu man Rights Act does not provide protection against certain classes of discrimination in housing situations.

For example, neither The Human Rights Act nor The Landlord and Tenant Act provides protection against discrimination on the basis of sexual preference or political association or political belief. I think it is time in Manitoba that citizens of 2 Manitoba had the right in housing rental situations t' be protected from that kind of discrimination. One of the most radical changes to the landlor' and tenant relationship contained in this bill, and on which I believe will provide even further hardship fa tenants who are facing stiff increases in October, i

Section 26 of the bill, which provides an innocuous looking amendment to

Section 11 6( 1) of the presen Act by inserting at the end of the sixth line therec the words "by that tenant". Essentially, what tha th ree-word stroke of the legislative pen does, is tha abolishes in Ma nitoba the one rent increase a yea rule.

Section 11 6( 1) as it now is provides for one ren increase a year for each rental unit. This provide some stability in the market and that stability wa there before The Rent Stabili zation Act wa introduced. Although with the repeal of the Ren Stabil ization Act, your landlord could charge a1 increase of whatever the marke t will bear, at leas with

Section 11 6(1) before Bill 83, the landlord coulc only do it once a year for any particular apartmen and as I indicated, that rule, if it's adhered to appli es or provides some stability in the rent8 market in that people are only facing one ren increase a year instead of two and th ree and fou rent increases a year. Now, with the amend ment proposed by thi government, every time there is a new tenant then can be a rent increase. When landlords did that i1 the past, it was called "rent gouging ".

Now ren gouging will be permitted under our Landlord an• Tenant Act and will, in fact, be legali zed by thi: government. I submit that this amendment is terribl: inflationary and will be particularly harmful an• destructi ve in the inner city, where the turnover rat• in apartment rental is very high. Once again, it wil be those who can least afford it who will suffer unde this government policy.

I should point out two observations on that score Number one, the report that was not tabled by th1 government having to do with decontrol pointed ou that in the observation of the Rent Stabili zatiol Board there were many instances, parti cularly ir older blocks in the inner city, where landlords wen taking more than one rent increase a year. In othe words, they were violating The Landlord and Tenan Act and they were violating The Rent Stabili zatior Act. Those violations, which were not reported to th1 Legislature, are termed by the Minister as bein! insignificant.

Well, I think it's significant whether o not the law is being compl ied with. The response o this government is not to try to enforce the Act, no the response of this government is to change the lav to suit the rent gougers. I would urge upon you t< take that

section out of this bill and at least provid1 some stabil ity to the rental market in Ma nitoba. Another provision which has been discus se1 publi cly and in the House is the amendment t<

Section 103(9) of The Landlord and Tenant Act. Bil 83 will permit the rentalsman to mediate a disputl between the landlord and tenant with respect t< continued possession and occupancy of residentia premises. A dispute like this apparently, under thi� legislation, can also be referred to the Director o Arbitration. I'd like to direct your attention briefly to Sectior 11 3( 1) as it now is under The Landlord and Tenan Act. lt now states, recovery of possession, unless 1

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 ant has vacated or abandoned rented premises, land lord shall not regain possession of the mises on the grounds tha t he is entitled to ;session, except under the author ity of an order eviction obtained under

Section

Section 111 vides a summa ry procedure whereby landlords obtain possession of premises through an order he county court. Now what is being proposed is a clamental change in the law.

The Landlord and 1ant Act enacted in 1970 contained the provision t you had to have a court order to be evicted n your prem ises if you didn't leave, because I eve it was the policy of the then government and s the poli cy as far as I know of every other vincial government in Canada, to ensure that no ' be ordered from his home, except by an order l court upon due consideration of all the evidence 3stablish that the owner or landlord actually has unds to obtain possession of the premises.

This 1er is now being given to a civil servant who could as easily as not be a political appointee. here have been court cases in the provinces of ish Columbia, Alberta and Ontario, in which the rts have held that legislat ive attempts to provide 3ntalsman's office with authori ty to evict tenants uncons titutional. lt was found to be onstitutional on the basis that the power to order 1eone out of his property is reserved to federally IOinted judges. These decisions held that the vince could not delegate this power to a political 10intee or a civil servant.

This government is 1mpting to undermine this constitutional principle permitting the rentalsman or the Director of itration to order tenants out of possession under r new authority.

I, for one, am convinced that the effect of this change will be to speed up the �tion process which, of cou rse, is what the dlords Association wants, and to dep rive tenants, ticularly the less soph isticated tenants, of their ts to remain in possession of their home unless ered out by a court. would suggest to you that there is no reason for change, and I would suggest to you that what is 1g to happen is that many tenants are going to be �uaded to go through the rentalsman process, ply because they have not the soph istication or resources with which to fight a legal case in a rt. hen we get to the final extinction of rent controls �anitoba, the portion of this bill that has received most attention and received the most protest n the public.

Section 37 of the bill before you 3als The Rent Stabil ization Act and it also repeals 1978 legislation on decontrol introduced by this ernment. The repeal is effective on July 1, 1980, 11atter when the bill receives Royal Assent. This is oactive legislation then, and I have no idea why it ; found necessary to make this legislation ·oactive to July 1st.

The gov ern ment has ctively killed rent controls over the last two years. removal of all suites outside of Winnipeg and ndon, of all suites in buildings built since 1973, a vision which rolled back from 1975 from this ernment, the exemption of all suites where rents e over 400, and of all suites where the tenants mtarily vacated has resulted in a gradual process lecontrol in the province of Manitoba. 3 At tha t time, I re call standing before this commi ttee and I recall the prom ises tha t the government made at that time. At that time, the government prom ised essentially two things.

Firstly, that rents would be monitored and steps would be taken if thi ngs were getting out of line. The government promised, secondly, that tenants who were decontrolled, who felt they were receiving unconscionable rent increases could appeal to the Rent Stab ilization Board. Now, this government's record on those promises is a very sad one. In 1979, a tenant took the Rent Stabi lization Board and the government to court, because he wasn't even notified that his suite had been decontrolled, despite the fact tha t the legislation contained exp ressed provisions that tenants had to be notified.

The Rent Stabil ization Board had been called on this issue by several tenants' groups and the Law Union and you will recall at that time that the board chairman, Mr. Chisvin, stated there was nothing wrong. When the tenant referred to, took the government and the Rent Review Board to court, he won. The Minister was asked, not by the court, the court dealt only with that particular situation, but that particular situation applied to a large number of cases because nobody had been given notice up to that time, and the Minister was asked to direct the board to change its practices to conform to its own legislation.

The Minister refused, his answer to tenants who were affected was, anyone who is affected can take the government to court. Well, I don't know how many times you have to take the government to court to establish the same principle. Either you administer and enforce your legislation as you pass it, or you pass different legislation. Now the maladmin istration and the arrogance in the administration of the Rent Review Program has persisted, I would say, until this very da y.

The reports tha t were produc ed on moni toring were produced reluctantly, and I unde rstand that the reports that were produc ed mana ged to be without some of the more contro versial contents that were obs erved by the people working at the Rent Stabili zation Board. In light of all this, I find it very difficult to find a policy rationale for the provisions in Bill 83 that terminate the Rent Control Program in the way that they do.

The Minister and the government can only be acting on, as far as I can see, their commi tment to property owners and developers to remove controls, and they are not considering at all the realities of the rental market in Ma nitoba today. In fact, I distinctly recall the Minister stating that it didn't matter what was in the monitoring report, that report was not going to have any effect on the government, the government was comm itted as a policy to the removal of rent controls, no matter what the realities of the rental mar ket in Manitoba are today. A few brief words about those realities.

At a housing seminar held at the University of Winnipeg in mid-June, a member of the Social Planning Council, who I believe will be speaking to you later, stated that the SAFER program which has been introduced by this government could be very inflationary, and that it encourages landlords to increase rents in the absence of controls, knowing that the government . will pay the difference for low income people. The

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 Social Planning Council has state d, or at least that member of the Social Planning Council stated at that time, that what is needed to stab ilize the housing market in Manitoba today is a sound housing policy, a sound housing policy consisting of a combination of rent subs idy, because there are so many people on fixed incomes who have fallen so far behind; controls on rent, so that those subsidies don't get out of hand; and that those controls should be applied particularly in the high-demand, low-su pply, low-income area, namely the inner city.

And the third plank of any adequate housing policy is publi c housing. This gov ernment has now elimi nated publi c housing. They are now in the process of eliminating rent controls, and what do we have left? The most inflationary of all options - rent subsidy only, su bsidies which will only line the pockets of lando wners and financial institutions as the money goes from governments through the pockets of the tenants to these institutions, and in many cases they'll be going through the pockets of the Welfare Department to these institutions.

The government claims that it is retaining, in Bill 83, a system of monitoring rents and arbitrating excessive rent increases. The system revealed in the legislati on, I would submit to you, is a sham, an administrative qu agm ire, and will be totall y ineffective, notwithstanding the amendments introduced by the Minister yesterday, which I have already referred to as possibly part of the gove rnment's program to depopula te Manitoba.

Insofar as monitoring is concerned, I would think that we can expect this government's performance to be consistent with that of the last two years, and particularly the la st two weeks. Th e promised monitoring reports are never produced until two years after the fact, and when they are produced, we wonder what's really in them. There's no provision in this legislation requiring such reports or requiring such reports to be tabled in the legislature. That was one of the criticisms in 1978; it remains a criticism today. Then, of course, there is the arbitration syst em, the so-called arbitration system.

There are many fatal flaws in this system, some of which have already been pointed out. Of course, if a landlord doesn't want to arbitrate, there won't be an arbitration. I think most tenants know what kind of protection that provides - literally nothing. Even if there were some method of arbitrat ing, one has to look at the meaning of excessive rent increase, which is the task that any arbitrator would have to apply. The meaning of excessive rent increase as it is defined in the proposed new

Section 12 0(6) of The Landlord and Tenant Act states, "For the purposes of subsection (7), excessive rent increases mean incr eases that have the effect of making the rent ch arge for the residential premises subs tantially in excess of the rent charge for comparable residential premises in the same general area in which the premises are locat ed." Now, under the 19 78 legislation there was a terminolo gy "unconscionable rent increa se.

" From experience with the Rent Stabili zation Board, I can tell you that the Board has been unable to determine what is unconscionable, because there is no guidance in the legislati on, and very few tenants 4 have gone to all the trouble of hiring a lawyer to find their way through the adm inistrat ive qua gm ire created by this government in 19 78. Now, taking this new definition, tenants would be wasting their time even more, asking for arbitration. lt is well known that there are four, five, six major rental agencies in Winnipeg, the Sm ith Agency, for exam pl e, Mr .

Mor antz' Globe General Agencies, Martin Bergen's chain of companies, Shelter Corp., which has been making su bstantial acquisitions in the Fort Rouge area. I think it's fair to say that these major rental agencies control th ree-quarters to 80 percent of the rental market in Winnipeg. And, if these renta agencies decide at what level they are going to se1 their rent, then rent ch arged for comp arable premises - which, of course, is the definition o1 excessive rent increases - will conform with rents being charged by the big four or five.

There will then be no such thing as an excessive rent increase, as with the big four or five rental agencies controllin!l the market there won't be that much difference tha1 something can be defined as excessive. I do not wish to spend a lot more time on the arbitration procedure, other than to say that clearl} the changes introduced by the Minister yeste rday do not meet the objections of the vast majority o1 tenants in Manitoba.

I would only point out again though, with respect to the role of the Minister in the arbitration process, that is the only arbitration tha1 can be binding under this legislation and in order for the procedure to begin, the Minister must take action. He must request the Director of Arbitration tc monitor and compile information on rent levels, ren1 increases and so on and submit a report to the Minister. The Minister, upon considering a report, may direct the director of arbitration to appoint a Board of Arbitration to arbitrate.

But the Minister can only do this if the following condi tions are met Firstly, in any part of the province, or in certain types or sizes or ages of residential premises, the repor1 must indicate that rent incr eases that are beinc charged by a specific landlord or a class of landlor d are excessive. And secondly - and of course we've already dealt with the question of what's excessive the choice of alternate, compa rable accommoda tion is limited in the same general area in which the residential premises are situated. So the arbitration procedure doesn't even come into being until after you'v e moved .

The Minister ha s ne auth ority to act if alternative comparable accommodation is not limited in the same general area in which the residential premises are situated. This has been this government's position throughou1 thi s bill; if you don't like it, move. That's th e government's answer to tenants.

The tenant who has a rent gouging complaint mus1 go to the Minister if he wishes to get bindin� ar bitration under this legislation, and the Director o1 Arbitrat ion's jurisdiction ex tends primar ily ove1 cla sses of accom moda tion or areas o· accommodation rather than individual situations Unl ess the particular situation can be related to a larger problem, there will be no report and there wil be no arbitration. I submit to you that the procedures set up unde1

Section 12 0 of the Act as it's proposed will be ever more toothless than the procedure which was set u�

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 19 78. There are no guideli nes to guide the rector of Arbi tration. There is no dir ection 1atsoever as to what is or is not excessive. In ort, rent controls are repealed in this province and bstituted with the discretion of the Minister. lt is ite clear what direction the discretion of the nister has taken in the last two years. There is no 1son to suggest that it will take any other direction the future.

I believe that it is safe to conclude that l so-called ar bitration process to be legislated in ction 120 of the new Landlord and Tenant Act will :eive as much usage as the Parents Maintenance t, recently revived by this government. lt will :ieve as much usage as that legislation received in l last 50 years and I under stand that that bill has ally been withd rawn from the House. 'lent control will be a thing of the past with this 1islation and the watchword for tenants will be "Let ! tenant beware" and land owners will charge what ! market will bear if you don't mind me being a poetic at this stage. want to deal briefly, again we're talking about at's wrong with this bill, with the changes that :ilitate the conversion of rental units to 1dominiums.

Section 38 of Bill 83 effects some Jstantial changes to The Condominium Act which I enable landlords to more easily convert rental 1ts to condominiums, and thereby take more rental 1ts off the market in Manitoba. 3ection 5 of the Act now requires the landlord to 1e consent of 50 percent of the tenants before the ilding is converted to a condominium and it further 1uires the landlord to give the tenant notice of his lion to buy his unit if the landlord intends to wert. And this option is exercisable only within 30 (S after receipt of it. �s

Section 5 now is in The Condominium Act, the hts of the tenant under any existing tenancy reement are preserved until the end of the ·eement. The proposed amendments to

Section 5 rmit the landlo rd to terminate the tenanc y ·eement on two months notice after the expiry of ' option to purchase. In effect , it prevents tenants ·m organi zing to prevent condomini umization ;ause the landlord does not have the consent of percent of the tenants. Now the landlord can evict Jse tenants who don't want to be 1dominiumized and simply not fill the suite, or fill suite only with a tenant who will consent. And ;, of course, is an abuse that has already been lespread and observed in the inner city area.

I'm e the Honourable Member for Fort Rouge has ;erved the situation where landlords are requiring ants to sign consent forms before they're allowed take up tenancy in certain buildings.

And we've m a situation at 18 8 Roslyn Road, where the dlord is already advertising the sale of these 1dominiums, eagerly awaiting the passage of Bill say to you, this will have a disastrous effect on rental housing market in Winnipeg, as more and re landlords will move to unlo ad their property, l unit at a time, for a total purch ase price that will 1lize incredible profits when compared to the jinal value of the property, and this of course will 1ove those units from the reach of low-income lple and will force low-income people out of the er city. To where?

I don't know. 5 I don't know where the government proposes to put people tha t it's forcing to move. The government has termin ated any involvement in public housing. I just don't know, other than if you've got your one month rent incr ease from being forced to move, perhaps you can catch the nearest bus, as I indicated earlier, to some other province where there is emplo yment.

And again, we see in this section, the trade -off for the landlord's right to convert to a condominium and give notice to vacate and get rid of the tenant is that where a tenant is evicted by a condominium notice, the landlord has to pay the tenant the actual cost of moving or an amount equal to one month's rent, whiche ver is the lesser. This a very small price to pay when you ana lyze the economics of condominiumi zation, and again we're looking at bus fare. The amendment of

Section 11 3 (4), which I referred to earlier, of course, goes along with this policy th rust of the government "families with school childr en can be evicted during the school year." lt matches up with

Section 5 of The Condominium Act, so that not even families with school childr en will have protection where the landlord wants to convert the property into a condominium. Now those, ladi es and gentlemen, are some of the obs ervations which I have on the legislation that is presently before the House and I have indicated to you the reasons why I personally am very opposed to those provisions which I have mentioned. I want to spend a few moments now on the reasons why thousands of other Ma nitobans are opposed to this bill.

I am, of course, the first speaker on this bill, and there will be many more; I believe that there will be many more who will be tabli ng similar material to that which I will be tabling for your perusal today. As of yesterday afternoon, I had received personally some 1, 000 signatures of people who are objecting to this bill, particularly the removal of rent controls, and I know there are several other people waiting to speak who have several hundr ed or thousands of signatures which we hope will aid the com mittee in its consideration of the importance of this bill for the public.

For your information, I table copies of the signatures of 1,000 Ma nitobans who care about this legislation significantly enough to put their name, addr ess and telephone number and some of the reasons for their objections on paper. While I am at it, I would like to table and read from some letters which I have received from individuals who expressed the desire tha t I express their concerns to you at this commi ttee. A lady from 144 Roslyn Road states tha t she has a foot injury and needs many treatments by a chiropractor. Only 11 appointments are covered by Medicare.

"I'm limping about, but I still think I could fill out about another two sheets, so you could send them out to me." Two sheets were sent out to that lady, and she returned two more signed petitions. A lady from 70 Garry Street writes, "I am sending you a small contribution. I am running easy with my money because I had quite a bit of cash dished out for groceries, medicine, etc., and I don't want to run short before the pension cheque comes in, which four weeks to wait. And I'm sorry I cannot go conversing to the commi ttee, as my health is poor, but I hope strong that we will get things in order." ..

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 A letter from a lady at 388 Wardla w. "I am definitely opposed to Bill 83 being passed by the government under the five headings which have been stated in the paper, which I am including in this letter." A Mr. Young, from 270 Roslyn Road. "I am writing at this time to add my support to defeating Bill 83. My rent here has risen from 234 to 270 beginning October 1s t. These government pirates must be stopped or I will be getting a future raise in rent at the approximate same level of 36 and more per month, which is now my increase. Please add my name to petition list.

I will be phoning to get on the list of speakers against Bill 83." You may be hearing from that gentleman later. Another lady writes yesterday, "Pl ease pl ace my name on the list of people speaking against Bill 83. I believe ending rent controls is unfair, not only to the pensioner on a fixed income but to all tenants, as the rent increase is going up to an unreasonable rate, comp letely out of hand, out of control. The rent control was the only protection that I had, as I would have been evicted in th e cold of winter, an unbeli evable situation. I was 10 0 percent in the right.

I don't want to go into detail or relive the experience, but thanks to the rent control and the office of the Rentalsman for their protecti on." And I have here a letter which was attached to a petition from the Glo ucester Apartments at 28 Woodrow Place, which is in the petitions which I have tabled: "We the undersigned, being tenants of the above apartment building, are greatly dist ressed at the recent rental increases that have been applied here. Incr eases vary from 35 percent to 47 percent, far from the 10 percent that has been bandied about.

This is quite an old building that has never had any substantial moderni zation and exterior work on the building seems to be the only form of improvement since its compl etion many years ago. "We all realized that, with lifting of rent controls, our rents would be increased, but World Wide Management Services, of 473 St. Marys Road, Winnipeg, Manitoba, who manage our building, have simply overstepped the bounds of reason. "The condi tion of the suites thems elves are below stand ard and, in many cases, in need of di re attention and repair.

Typical tenant compla ints are: suites in desperate need of painting; badly cracked walls need plastering; rotting ceilings due to water seepage from steam-heat radiators; rusting pipes; porch extensions that are in poor condition and need to be properly insulated, many of which leak badly when it rains. "We feel that, in consideration of the age and condi tion of these suites, the rental increases that have been allo tted to us are totally unwarranted . One and two-bedroom suites are being rented anywhere from 200 to 375 in th ose conditions.

For the sum being asked for these suites, we feel that utilities should be included in the monthly charge, as well as cablevision, better laundry facilities provided, as well as parking facilities made available - at this point, no parking facility at all - as well as the comp letion of repairs stated above.

We feel very strongly that these increases are both unfair and unjust." And with respect to the Minister's amendments, this group of people from the Gl oucester Apartments 6 states, "If we wish to leave our apartments, let it bE our decision in the first place, not because we an being forced to move from the result of thes1 increases, which have no sound basis. Many tenant� have lived here for some time and consider this thei1 home. We would greatly appreciate any comments 01 assistance you can provide us in helping to deal witt this problem." A letter from a lady at Wilmot Place.

"There arE many aspects of Bill 83 which are regressive, and would support an effort to repeal the bill." And shE states in her letter tha t her rent incr ease i� reasonable - that's the only one so far. A lette1 from Mr. Fred Coleman. I believe that this letter ha! already been sent to the Minister, and there is ne need to read it into the record again. A very interesting letter from a lady living a 47 400 Assiniboine, a Mrs. Selinger. "1, too, am bu· another victim of a gouging landlord of the Camelo· Block. As a matter of fact, this addr ess should ring � bell" and she goes into a previous case.

"Although might be a bit more fortuna te than some others whc might have had even higher rent increases thar myself, my own rent increase, beginning 1 October will amount to 19 .5 percent, from 226 to 270 pe1 month. In this suite live only my wife and I on thE third floor up, furnished only with fridge and stove no elevator, rugs, drapes, nor parking facilities. WE supply our own power, with coin-operated washer! and dryers. So besides fridge and stove, we are supplied with heating without thermo stats, meanin� we are at the mercy of the landlord. We kee� ourselves warm by fighting for heat in the winter.

Se now, with decontrols, it will be, stop complaining 01 30-d ays notice to move. In all of my 11 years as < tenant in this suite I have supplied all decoratin� supplies and labour out of my own pocket. So whal my 44.00 a month rent raise is all about and for, I de not know. We just hope that the present cowboys under Wile Bill Hickok Lyon in the next provincial election will bE steamrolled to kingdom come, without any trace. lr all truth in Soviet Russia, other than religion, the common man has more protection and rights againsl gougers and crooks than in much of our so-callee free society.

Attached I wish to add a few dollar� which might help to defray costs. As my wife and I too, are older people, just short of pension or to be pensioned in the near future, just making ends meet.

I don't intend to read any more letters, I think thal the letters that the Minister has receiv ed, and those letters indicate clearly - and I'll table those letter� for the commi ttee's consideration - indicate clearl� that this is not a situation where the average genera rent increase on the lifting of controls is 10 percent This is a situation, as was indicated by the reporl that was prepared by the Minister's offic ials, thal rent increases in the older buildings in the inner cit) are going to be very detrimental to senior citizens students, nurses, people on fixed incomes, the loll\ income people, who are living in the inner city, are the ones tha t are getting ham mered by thi! legislation.

I suspect, that memb ers of thE Conservative caucus, such as Mr. Wilson; such a� Mr. Steen; such as the Minister of Health; such a� the Attorney-General, if he's here, if he's in towr long enough to get phone calls; such as the Ministe1 of Recreation and Tourism; such as the Minister ol

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 ommunity Services, all of these MLAs represent mstituencies that have a majority, or at least a Jbstantial number of tenants who are being effected 1 this regressive legislation and I'm sure that those you that I mentioned have heard about this from >ur constituents. Finally, ladies and gentlemen, I come to that part my presentation where I would hope to persuade 1u to take another course.

I think it is well known at the basic position that tenants would take is that nt control should remain in place, that there should � a maximum allowable increase beyond which ndlords have to justify their rent inc rease to some lminis trative body. Now, it would appear that this government is Jilosophically comm itted, in spite of the situation at exists out there, that the government in its 1rrison mentality is philosophically comm itted to the moval of rent controls; philosophically comm itted a particular group of people, I'm not sure who.

In that case, then the question has to be how? 1d the question has to be what kind of protection > you provide for individuals who are detrimentally fected by the process? The legislation that has been introduc ed by this >Vernment, I submit to you, does not even meet the oposed policy statements of the government. The JVernment is saying we are ending rent controls. 1e Minister has stated on many occasions that it is >t appropriate to substitute another form of rent mtrols, we are te rminating rent controls.

The inister has just as consistently stated, however, we :mt to provide protection in the gouging situations; � want to provide protection for tenants who are hit th unjustified rent increases. I say to you this bill 1es not provide that protection and I say to you, dies and gentlemen, that if you really want to ovide protection in the removal of rent controls, in e decontrol process, you ha ve, on the statute Joks now, legislation that was passed in 19 78 that ould be altered a little bit and provide both of your >licy thrusts.

Now if I was Minister of Consumer fairs in this govern ment, and I was commi tted to lilosophically removing controls and at the same ne I wanted to ensure that the common person out ere was protected, this is what I would do. First of you take

Section 15 .5 of the Rent Stabili zation :t, which was enacted in 1978 and you repeal that. �ction 15 .5 is the sect ion tha t says that the gulations do not apply to any residential premises respect of any tenancy agreement entered into for term commencing after a date which shall not be :er than June 30, 19 80, affixed by the Lieutenant )Vernor- in-Council. That would effectively leave the Rent Stabilization :t in pla ce. The repeal of that

section would ensure e continuation of the Act and the gradual decontrol ocess tha t was started under the 1978 legislation. >w why this process has to go from gradual to a mplete taking the cap off in one fell swoop is 'yond me. As of the dates of the reports that were llled in the Legislature, that is the end of 19 79, proximately 30 percent of units still under controls Brandon and Winnipeg had been decontrolled. The amendment that I'm proposing to

Section 15 .5 the Rent Stabilization Act, would continue the adual process of decontrol rather than removing tally, all protection, as Bill 83 proposes. 7 In addition, there are some amendments which I would propos e to Sect ion 28 of the Rent Stabili zation Act. Under

Section 28 as it now is, as it was passed by this government in 19 78. The procedure is fairly simple. Where a suite has been decontrolled and its decontrolled with the Rent Stabi lization Board, and its decontrol led for a particular reason and the rent that's going to be charged is mo nitored by the Rent Stabilization Board, where that decontrol occurs and where the tenant feels that he has received an unconscionable rent increase, the tenant can take his case to the Rent Review Board. A rent review officer then investigates his case and he attempts to mediate.

He attempts to mediate between the landlord and the tenant and if the rent review officer can come up with a solution that is fair and equitable, in both the eyes of the tenant and the la ndlord, then the mediation works and a rent is set by agreement on the mediation. Ho wever, if rent review officer is unable to mediate a satisfactory solution, he is then obl igated to write a report on the situation and the report is forwarded to the Rent Stabi lization Board; and it must be done so within 30 days.

The Rent Stabilization Board then has the authority, under the Rent Stabili zation Act, to make a decision, a binding decision, a decision that is binding upon both the landlord and the tenant, as to what the rent will be for that suite. Now this is the legislation that this government is repeal ing. This is this government's own decontrol legislation. I ask why? Why is that legislation being repealed if the objective is to get out of controls and at the same time provide protection for tenants who are being gouged?

Well the only reason is because you don't want to provide any controls, because if you did you would stick with the legislation that you've got and you would improve the procedure that a tenant has under

Section 28 of the present Rent Stabili zation Act to get a binding arbitration from the Rent Stabilization Board. The Minister has introduc ed all kinds of fluff to try and slough off the binding arbitration issue but that, ladies and gentlemen, is still the issue.

That is still the issue for the many many thousands of tenants in this city who have received notices of unjustified rent increases, and unle ss and until you are prepared to keep the legislation that you have or, through this legislation that you have introduced, provide for a binding procedure whereby tenants can get some justice, you are going to have thousands of upset tenants on your hands.

Again I re mind the Hon ourable Members for Crescentw ood, Wolseley, Radisson, River Heights, Fort Garry, Osborne, Fort Rouge -(I nterject ion)- I think the Honourable Member for Fort Rouge is on the right side of this issue - St. Matthe ws - yes, Mr. Domino. I remind you of the numbers of voters in your constituencies that are concerned about this legislation and I would hope that you can set aside the idiology of the front benches for sufficiently long to persuade this government that they are making a very fatal mistake with Bill 83.

Tha t conclude s my presentation ladies and gentleman and I have for you cop ies of the amendments which I spoke of.

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 MR. CHAIRM AN: Order please. Mr. Savino, we thank you for your present ation. If there are questions pertaining to your presentation are you prepared to try and answer them? MR. SAVINO: I certainly am, Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN: Are there any questions from any members of the comm ittee? Mr. Parasiuk. MR. PARASIUK: Mr. Chairp erson, I have some questions for Mr. Savino.

In your opinion, if a landlord has jacked up the rents by 50 percent or so, which is not that unusual, given the documentation tha t you provided us and the type of calls we've received from constituents, would you think that there would be a great likelihood that the landlord would volunteer for arbitration having jacked up the rents by 50 percent? MR. SAVINO: No , I think the answer to tha t question is fairly obvious. Why should anyone consent to a procedure which may result in him losing something if he doesn't have to? I think the answer is evident on the factual situation that you have given.

Unless the individual is a very benevolent fellow who for some reason feels that he should take a loss, otherwise why would he give a 50 percent notic e in the first place? MR. PARASIUK: I would like to just pursue this question of the economic inc entives that are built in for landlords not to go with arbitration, that are built into this legislation and have been built into the amendments brought in by th e Minister.

In a situation that we've seen in the paper today, where I think the former provincial coroner has had his rent incr eased from 19 0 to 300 per month, that's an increase of 11 0 per month, which ends up being an amount in excess of 1 ,300.

In that situation, if this former provincial corone r the n tries to go for arbitration and the landlord refusos you find yourself in a situation where the landlord would be making an extra 1, 200 or 1, 300 but he then can, under the Minister's formula, buy out the tenant without the tenant having any redress whatsoever, and it's not clear to me yet whether in fact he buys him out for 190 which was the old rent, or whether in fact he buys him out for 300 which is the new rent. But certainly you then run into a situation where it's to the economic advantage of the landlord to jack up the rents.

He'll be making an extra 900 at least if this happens. Is this the argument tha t you were presenting? MR. SAVINO: Yes, I believe that provision which the Minister has introduc ed as what I would call, window dressing, not only works to the disadvantage of the tenant in that kind of situation, but it also acts as an incentiv e for landlords to evict low income tenants.

And when you are talking about the condomi niumization situation, and when you are talking about the situation that is developing in many of the th ree story walk-ups in the Fort Rouge area and in the Osborne area and in the Assiniboine area, the situation that's going to develop there is these 50 percent increases will be imposed on the senior 8 citizens and the students; they will have no cho ice but to move.

The landlord will pay the month's rent and again it is not clear at what amount, the old rent or the new rent that he pays, nor is it clear how the tenant exercises that right. lt sounds like another administrative quagmire to me, but the net result is that the landlord is then able to replace that low income tenant with someone who can afford to pay and a few years down the road, or a few months down the road, the land lord may want to condominiumi ze and convert that rental payment to a mortgage and again the low income person is out on the street. And again I ask you, where is tha t person going to go? MR.

PARASIUK: Mr. Savino, I am certain you must be aware of the fact that there are many areas in the city that have vacancy rates that are in the order of 1. 4 percent, 1. 7 percent, and these people really don't have too great an option.

Do you believe that people who live in apartment blocks, as tenants, indeed contribute to the neighbourhood, indeed contribute to the communi ty, and would in fact their forced wholesale move by this type of legislation to areas outside their neighbourhoods which may have greater vacancy rates, do you think this will be detrimental to the fabric of that neighbourhood, to the fabric of that commu nity? MR. SAVINO: Oh, certainly, I've encou ntered in the last couple of weeks numerous people who have lived in the same building for ten or twelve years and who are part of a community within tha t building.

That's one of the reasons why tenants are fighting so hard against this bill, because many of them like where they are living and they like the communi ties where they are living and they would like to stay where they are and that's why they are fighting, because if this bill is passed they feel that many of them will have to move, and there are young people out there fighting for senior citizens who have been resident in a block for 15 or 20 years and that's part of the communi ty thing that is going on. Yes, Mr. Parasi uk, I think that is a correct observation. MR.

PARASIUK: I would like you to inform us as to whether, in fact, the Conservative government cut out funding for the Manitoba Landlords' Association which it used to get, I think, two or th ree years ago, and the Landlords' Assoc iation - sorry, the Tenants' Association. I think there was a Manitoba Tenants' Association. This was a group that was funded by the government in order to provide some assistance to single tenants who found themselv es somewhat powerless and often unsophis ti cated enough to deal with landlords and they were able then to receive some assistance from the Manitoba Tenants' Associati on.

Can you confirm that this government indeed cut off funding to that group? MR. SAVINO: Yes, that is correct. In 19 77, I believe it was, the Associated Tenants Action Committee received two gr ants. One from the provincial emplo yment program which I understand doesn't exist any mo re, and the other from Canada Manpower, and both thos e grants were cut off at the end of 1977. In addition to tha t some of you may remember I was here last year on the Public Utilities

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 oard legislation, where this government terminated 1e appeal, specifically by legislation, termi nated the ;>peal of the Associated Tenants Action Committee n the rate structure of Manitoba Hydro. IR. PARASIUK: Mr. Savino, is legal aid available to 1nants who are involved in landlord disputes, or isputes with landlords? IR. SAVINO: That's a very difficult question to 1swer. I was in legal aid myself a couple of years JO and at that time legal aid was available on both 1 individual and a collective basis, to groups of 'nants as well as individual tenants.

I am not aware •at legal aid has been active under this government the group represe ntation, although I bel ieve that if person is poor enough to qualify for legal aid, and he or she is facing some kind of a cour t ·oceed ing, then the legal aid plan will act, but sofar as people who require advice or immediate ;sistance in a dispute involving the Rentalsman or 'e Rent Stablization Board or something like that, it very difficult to get legal aid in that kind of tuation. R.

PARASIUK: In your opinion, as a lawyer, �oking at the proposed legislation and the nendments, do you feel that many of the tenants at you have come across will in fact require some ;sistance, either from an organization or from wyers in trying to deal with landlo rds who have wyers at their disposal, especially if they are large ndlords with two or three thousand suites and it's their benefit to get an extra 10 or 20 per month. 1at starts amounting to a very very substantial sum money for them. R. SAVINO: Yes, especially when you are dealing th as many as 3,000 or 4,000 suites as some major vners are.

Yes, the changes introduced by this �islation are so fundamental that I would anticipate at there is going to be some considerable litigation 1rrounding these changes. I have already indicated 1e possible constitutional problem. There is also the ·ob lem of what happens in the hia tus period 1tween the time that this government is going to oclaim this Act in force, namely July 1s t, 1980, and e time that the Act is passed. That's going to eate a lot of legal problems. The Minister keeps jockeying around with various lrmutations and com bina tions of directors of bitrations and the Minister.

Again there, that's •ing to be a little bit of a legal quagmire for quite me time until people are able to understand what e Minister's policies are going to be. That is one of e reasons why I have urged tha t Bill 83 be •andoned insofar as its treatment of rent controls is onc erned because you have already got the Jislation in place and people now understand how at system works and there is a fundamental >ruption that occurs at the beginning of this kind of program.

Ins tead of just continuing the �chanisms that we now have which would eliminate of that disruption and make it more clear to ople what they can do, what is being proposed is very disru ptive process where that whole �chanism that has been monitoring and controlling nts in this provinc e for five years is being 9 disbanded and some other mechanism is being set up, and I don't know how that mechanism is going to be structured, or who those people are going to be. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. McKenzie. MR. J. WALLY McKENZIE: Mr. Savino are you a renter? MR. SAVINO: No, I am not. I rent office space downtown.

I pay a high price for that, believe me. MR. McKENZIE: Have you had any complaints or phone calls from people like in my constituency, Roblin or Rock Lake or Swan River? MR. SAVINO: To tell you the truth, Mr. McK enzie, I have to admit that no I have not had any complaints from rural constituencies. MR. McKENZIE: Thank you. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Green do you wish to ask a question? MR. SIDNEY GREEN: Mr. Chairman, there were a couple of areas that I wanted to discuss.

Referr ing to the mediation procedure and the arbi tration procedure, you gave your opinion that these were ultra vires, as infringing upon the federal government to appoint judges of superior jurisdiction who are the only ones who have authority to evict a tenant. Am I correct in the sum mary that I took? MR. SAVINO: There is just one point you are not correct on, Mr. Green. I am suggesting that this could lead to constitutional problems. I am not making the categorical statement that it's ultra vires, I am suggesting that there have been cases to suggest that this kind of legislation is ultra vires. MR.

GREEN: For the reasons that I have given. MR. SA VINO: Right. MR. GREEN: I believe that you were suggesting that this legislation could be ultra vires. All right if that is the qualification, but if it is ultra vires it is for the reason that I have cited back to you, that it's a superior court's right, appointed by the federal government, to remove a person from their home.

I do n't wish to agree or disa gree with the legislation for the mo ment, the mediation or arbitration, because we had been pursued during our years in government to try to have sort of the "good offices" type legislation which people could submit to before going to court, but as I read the two sections in the Act, neither would be binding if the landlord or the tenant chose not to make it binding. Is that correct? MR. SAVINO: Yes, I beli eve that the provision requires, the provision for tha t kind of arbitration requires the consent of both parties. MR.

GREEN: If both parties consent to have something arbitrated, even if it is a matter which could normally be subm itted to a superior court judge, arbitra tion, under those circumstances, and

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 The Arbitrations Act in the province of Manitoba, have not been held to be ultra vires. There are numerous provisions where people can sumbit a dispute to arbitration even though that dispute could normally, without the consent of either one of them or both of course, could only be decided by a superior court judge, but arbitration is a procedure which some considerable to be desirable, and to my mind has never been held to been ultra vires if both parties concurred in it. MR. SAVINO: The argument that you make, Mr.

Green, is an argument tha t might very well be advanced by government lawyers in a constitutional case. I don't think tha t the law is clear one way or another on that par ticular point involving this particular type of legisla tion; there have been some conflicting decisions. All I am saying is that it could lead to some constitutional problems and I don't really see why that particular power should be taken away from the courts; why the power to remov e someone from their home should be given to any body other than a court. MR. GREEN: As I see it, again as I read it, Mr.

Savino, and I am interested in this now from a professional point of view, if I may be. The provision, first of all, has to be either acqu iesced in, or agreed to by both parties, and the authority tha t is given is to come to a binding agreem ent. There is no authority, given either the arbitrator or the mediator, to remove somebody from their home or to obtain a sheriff to remove somebody from their home, that still would have to go to court. MR. SAVINO: That is an interesting observation and perhaps an oversight in the drafting of the bill.

The present legislation requires, first of all, a court order of possession and then, if the tenant does not move, at that point then the applicant in the court must go for an order for eviction. Now if the Rentalsman were to give an order for possession, the provisi ons covering orders for eviction would still be in the Act, and I don't know whether that order would be enforceable. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Savino, I see no order, no power, with the greatest of respect, I see no power in either the Rentalsman or the arbitrator - and I want to qua lify, I am not suggesting that this is a good procedure - but I have heard it suggested by so many people, of all political persuasions, particularly thos e who identify with what I thought was my pol itical persuasion, that this type of good offices, this type of negotiation, this type of facility on the part of the government was preferable to court, tha t I am not questioning that or approving of it, but I see nothing in the legislation giving either the Rentalsman or the arbitrator the power to evict anybody.

I see the arbitrator as being entitled to come to a decision which forms then a decision which, if I wanted to evict a tenant, I would have to sue on the basis of enforcing that arbitration award which is normal in arbitration proceed ings. Am I correct in at least in my professional thinking? MR. SAVINO: I believe that is corr ect, Mr. Green, but of course you realize, as well as I do, the lengthy 10 procedure tha t would be involved there, and if a tenant did move after the order of the rentalsman, that would be the end of it. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Savino, having enacted legislation which some cour t has subsequently ruled to be ultra vires, I'm aware of the dangers. I also am aware tha t the courts are sometimes wrong, particularly when they find agains t a position that I'm advancing. But I'd like to proceed , Mr. Savino, because I am worried about riding crest which is going to take me to a place from which there is no return. I ask you, Mr.

Savino, whether it is now the case, which I believe to be the case, that the law at present requi res landlords to be governed by a certain rent and to keep tenants at that rent without the power of evicting them, except for lim ited reasons as defined in the Act; that that is what we are atte mpting to maintain. Because if you have rent control, you must have possession control; one cannot go without the other. Is tha t correct? MR. SAVINO: Yes. MR.

GREEN: Therefore, at the present time, I gather, the tenant can move any time he wants to and frequently do, but the landlord is req uired to keep a tenant at a rental set by the government. MR. SAVINO: No, he's required to keep the rental for tha t suite at the same rent for a period of 12 months after the last rent incr ease. MR. GREEN: Yes. MR. SAVINO: lt doesn't matter how many tenants there are in tha t particular suite, the rent remains the same for 12 months. MR. GREEN: And he's req uired to keep tha t rental, which I have indicated , by a law set by the government. That is correct? MR.

SAVINO: Under the present Rent Stabil ization Act, if the suite has not been decontrolled, he can only increase the rent by the allowable percentage or apply for more. MR. GREEN: Then you tell me where my statement is correct, because I don't wish to be inc orrect, tha t a landlord is required to keep a tenant at a rental which is fixed by law by the government. Is tha t correct? MR. SAVINO: I would say that is not correct. MR. GREEN: Tell me where I'm wrong. MR. SAVINO: The percentage increase for some suites is set by regulation under

Section 15 of The Rent Stabili zation Act. MR. GREEN: For those suites then - I mean I want to find out where our differences are - which are set by the regulation they're referring to and which are presently occupied, a landlord is required to keep tha t tenant with certain exceptions which are specified in the Act, at a rental which is fixed by law.

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 MR. SAVINO: At an increase over last year, which is fixed by law. MR. GREEN: Exactly. Well, that rental, whatever it may be, is fixed by law. it's set out in the statute. He does not have the unila teral right to set it. MR. SA VINO: I think I see the point you are driving at, Mr. Green. MR. GREEN: I don't know that myself, I'm really trying to find out whether I am right that there is a present law requiring a landlord to keep a tenant at a rental which is fixed by law. MR.

SA VINO: There is a present law which enables the government to do that, but the government has chosen not to do that. The government has not enacted any regulations in 19 80-8 1. MR. GREEN: What you're proposing, Mr. Savino, and if it will comfort you any, although it may not, what I have agreed with in the Legislature is that the present bill not be enacted and that the old one be continued. Under the old bill, the one that is in existence today because there is no new law, a landlord can be required to keep a tenant at a rental which is set by law. MR. SAVINO: Yes. MR. GREEN: Okay.

You would not, at least I think you would not, and I would not - and I am sure I would not - want to require a tenant to be required to stay in a premises at a rental and under conditions which are set by law. The tenant is now free to move. MR. SAVINO: Yes. MR. GREEN: You would not agree to an additional control added to the rental control legislation, which said that no tenant can leave premises if the landlord accepts the rents as set by law. MR. SAVINO: I don't know what the purpose of such legislation would be. MR. GREEN: There is such legislation where controls have reached the ulti mate.

You cannot move without the authority of the state. MR. SAVINO: I don't think I would favour that kind of legislation, if that's what you're asking me, no. MR. GREEN: As a matter of fact, I said I think you wouldn't and I said I know I wouldn't and, therefore, I am worried as to where controls ulti mately go, because I had seem them go far and beyond what the crest of the immediate takes them. Therefore, I ask you, Mr. Savino, now that we have reached this position, do you or do you not ultima tely believe in controlling rents as between private land owners and private tenants? MR.

SAVINO: I believe, and I bel ieve that this is a position that is supported by not only political observations but by observations of sound housing policy, that rent controls have to remain in place, 11 once you have put them in place, until there is a sufficient supply of adequa te aff ordable housing. What I said at the outset is that this government has abandoned any efforts to maintain the supply of public housing. When you do that and you take rent controls off at the same time, you have a very volatile market. MR. GREEN: I couldn't be more in agreement, Mr.

Savino, and therefore I ask you whether you would concur in what is my view - and I will state it to see whether you do concur or not - and I'll make it a big one so there will be no argument, a 15 percent general vacancy factor, which covers all forms of accommodation, you don't need controls and if you have a zero vacancy factor, controls will not work. MR. SAVINO: Will not work to what? MR. GREEN: That if you had a zero vacancy factor, controls will not work. Both the landlord and the tenant will figure a way to avoid the controls. MR.

SAVINO: That may be so, but where you have a zero vacancy factor, what you need in your housing policy is development of more public housing, as well as controls, until you've got that housing in place. MR. GREEN: Mr. Savino, I agree with you entirely. So isn't the ulti mate solution to this problem the provision by the public of sufficient for ms of accommodations of all standards, which would make the vacancy factor sufficient to provide for a free - and I underline that - a real free choice as between the landlord and tenant, where they both can do what they want to without state interference. MR.

SAVINO: Sure, absolutely. MR. GREEN: Thank you. MR. BRIAN CORRIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Savi rio, I just have a few questions. Mr. Parasiuk asked you questions relative to legal aid provision for tenants who wish to avail themselv es of the provisions of the rent control program and Act. You mentioned in your submission that a number of large management companies had been able to secure a su bstantial portion of the rental market and in such a way that you felt that they effectively could control, I gue ss, hun dreds, if not thousands, of un its in particular comm unities and neighbourhoods. MR.

SAVINO: Yes. MR. CORRIN: And you indicated that it was very difficult, particula rly having consideration for the provisions of this particular Bill 83, it was very difficult to imagine how an individual tenant could effectively make a case when confronting that sort of raw power. MR. SAVINO: Yes. MR. CORRI N: You've also told us and we all know that you've had considerable experience working with tenants' associations and presumably with The Rent Stabili zation Act, as well, and the board. Presuming Bill 83 is to pass, and I'm presuming that

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 it will, on that presumption do you think it would be of any utility for the government to consider, prior to giving assent to this piece of legislation, provisions that would enable tenants and t<�mants' associations to bargain col lectively with these large management associations? If you do, can you tell us why; can you tell us wha t advantage you see in that and how that would help tenants? MR. SAVINO: Yes, I bel ieve that one form of control, of course, th at can work is col lective bargaining.

Unfortunately, the present system that we have with regard to tenancies in that respect involves much more the individual conta ct between tenant and landlord than it does col lective contact. I would think that in the abs ence of rent controls, if tenants were to organize In much the same way tha t trade unions organize and to have the authority under legislation to do so, and to have the authority to bargain col lectively unde r that legislation, that could act as a form of control upon the market. But as the law now is, tenants who did that would probably be penalized.

Tenants who did that, the organizers of that kind of thing, I'm sure, would be the recipients of the largest rent incr eases. They would be larger and larger until they were gone because there really is no protection for individuals who would attempt to do that. In short, my ans wer is yes, I think colle ctive barg aining can exercise some restraint in the marketplace, but unless there is some statutory framework within which collectiv e bargaining can operate, as it does in the trade union field, it's not going to work. MR. CORRIN: I see.

So you're satisfied that within the context of this par ticula r bill and the amendments it's going to make, it will be relatively insignificant, but if there were provision made to the law that would make if effective, that the col lective bargaining approach migh t, in fact, enhance the position of the tenant. MR. SAVINO: Yes, but I feel quite strongly that this bill just doesn't go anywhere near meeting the needs of tenants in the situations that they find thems elves in right now. Okay, you're talking about a collective bargaining situation.

Remember that in any kind of col lective bar gaining situa tion it inv olves organization, volu nteers, time, people getting other people together. What tenants in this province, in this city, are facing toda y is that a very large number of them have leases which legally they must sign by the first of August, and tha t doesn't leave very much time if this Ho use is going to pass some col lective bargaining legislation between now and the first of August. That doesn't leave very much time for those tenants to deal with the particular situation that faces them now.

I believe that the kind of thing you're talking about might be a long- term approach to the problem , but the immedia te problem has to be addressed by some form of control over the unjustified level of rent increase that we have seen since the government has announced this bill. MR. CORRIN: My conc ern immedia tely is tha t

Section 121(1) , the provision that enables a referral 12 to be made to the Director of Arbitration, could be made more effect ive if there was some provision for collective bargaining as opposed to what I cons true to be individual disputes, bargaining built into that. I don' t like it for the same reasons you have mentio ned in your submission. There is no compuls ory requirement requiring the landlord to submit to arbitration, but it seems to me that in some cases it may well happen that a landlord will submit.

But in those cases my concern, and I have expressed this in the House and now I ask you what you think, is that in thos e cases it will be of little avail to the individual tenant to arbitrate through the director of arbitration with the landlord, and of course its rental agent, unle ss the tenant can become apprised of all the relevant circums tanc es with respect to the entire apartment complex in which he or she lives. MR.

SAVINO: That's one of the reasons why I am urging before this comm ittee tha t The Rental Stabili zation Act decontrol provisions be continued because the structure is there for the Rental Stabili zation Board to monitor whole buildings rather than just an individual situation, and to look at the expenses and income of an entire building as an entire operation.

This bill just does not give any authority for that kind of an investigation and it's correct to point tha t out, but I would say the solution is not to amend Bill 83, as it now is, but to retain The Rent Stabili zation Act and work through the mechanisms that already exist. MR. COR RIN: Ha ve you, Mr. Savino, in your considerations, been able to un derstand why the government seemingly has discriminated, as between the class of tenants that were the subject of 19 78 decontrol legislation and those who will be affected by 19 80's Bill 83?

Can you understand why the government would choos e to deal alternatively and se emingly in a rather discrimina tory fashion, as between those two groups of tenants within the province. MR. SAVINO: No, I am baffled by that. As I say, the 19 78 legislation is directed towards the purpose which the Minister has indicated is the pol icy of his government, the removal of controls; he's indicated that his other policy principle is to protect tenants from gouging.

His legislation is there from 1978 to provide that protect ion, and no, I have no idea why the Minis ter wants to now cha nge the whole ballgame in midstream, other than, as I indic ated, land owners and developers come first. MR. CORRIN: Do you remember, Mr. Savino, can you tell us from your knowledge of the former provisions, which tenants were taken out of decontrol in 1978? What sort of tenants were they and how was the decontrol effect ed? MR.

SAVINO: You have all your newer buildings, the buildings that were built after 19 73, under the previous Rent Stabi lization Act buildings built after 19 75 were exempt - and that's a very important point to note. The government, and I imagine you will have a representative from the Housing and Urban Dev elopment Association of Manitoba or Canada

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 come before you and tell you the same thing, has been talking about high vacancy rates in the suburban areas and has been talking about the need to remove ourselves from controls because this has a detrimental affect on the construction of new housing, etc. lt is important as membe rs of the comm ittee to understand tha t the rent control program that we have had in this province has not applied to new construction. lt has not applied to new construction under the NDP program and it has not applied to new cons truction under the Conservative program.

I cannot for the life of me understand any justification for the removal of rent controls that states that because of rent controls we have inhibiting factors on new construction, because the controls simply have not applie d to new construction. To use that as a justification to get out of controls, that we have to uncontrol the rest of the marke t because the new construction market is not controlled doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever. MR. CORRIN: Am I not right, Mr. Savino, in my recollection that in 19 78 we decontrolled all units where the rent was over 400. MR. SAVINO: That's correct. MR.

CORRIN: I am wondering, in view of that, .vhether seemingly we have created an inequ ity, an injustice as between high income tenants who were decontrolled pursuant to what you have described as the more desirable provisions of The Rent Stabi lization Act, and the lower income tenants who �re now being decontrolled and who were seemingly l>eing given little recourse. I am wondering why, can (OU fathom, because I can't, can you fathom why the go ver nment would want to gi ve preference to :>resumably higher income tenants as opposed to ower income tenants?

Why wouldn't they accord the >ame rights now, in 1980, as they accorded the more Nealthy tenants of this province in 19 78? III R. SAVINO: That's a very good question, and I :tm not the Minister of Consumer and Corporate ll.. ffairs, so I can't really answer. III R. CORRIN: Mr. Savino, I wanted to ask you also :�bout some technical provisions in the bill. There is >rovision in

Section 10 39, this is 21 in the bill, 10 39 >f The Landlo rd and Tenant Act, this is the provision hat amends The Landlo rd and Tenant Act and !Ssentially enlarges the classes of disputes which the ientalsman may int ervene in. This provides an !xpande d cl ass of areas where the re can be nediation by the Rentalsman. In 121(1) which is on )age 12 of the bill, and there has been contr oversy n the House about this, and I was wondering if you :ould provide us with your legal advice.

There is a >rovision and I will just read it. lt says, "where a lispute is referred by the Rentalsman to the director >f arbitration for arbitration, he shall in writing notify he landlo rd and the tenant acco rdingl y; and ogether with the not ification the dir ector of 1rbitration shall attach a notice of ob jection form 'tating tha t either the landlord, or the tenant, or >oth, may object to the arbitration by filing the 10tice of objection with the director of arbitration not 13 later than seven clear days from the date of the notifica tion." There has been concern that the provisions of 10 39 are not sufficiently broad as to allo w a Rentalsman to media te a disp ute involving rent, because nowhere in those four sub-sections is there specific reference to such a case.

There has been a cont roversy and I believe, with all due respect to the Minister, I believe he has said that if necessary he will make an amendment to make this clear, but do you feel that it is clear now that a Rentalsman can mediate a dispute involving rent and thereby send it on to the director of arbitration or do you feel there should be a clarifying amendment? MR. SAVINO: it's clear now that the Rentalsman has no authority to mediate a rent dispute. The only body with that authority under our present law is the Rent Stabilization Board. The Landlo rd and Tenant Act contains an innocuous

section that refers to the abili ty of, I belie ve, the Lieutenant-Governor-in Council to give jurisdiction to the Rentalsman over certain things but that I suppose could be a route by which the Minister could give jurisdiction. But unless there is a specific reference in this Act to the Rentalsman's authority to adjudic ate rental dis putes, I think it's quite arguable that the Rentalsman has not got that authority unless he's expressly given it, and he is not expressly giv en it by this bill.

But it was my understanding that was one of the amendments that the Minister was talking about yeste rday, but I haven't seen it. MR. CORRIN: Ano ther amend ment which the Minister has introduc ed generally, we haven't, Mr. Savino, for your information, we have not got drafted amendments at this point, with respect to the four points that were made public yesterday by the Minister. He has provided us kindly with a copy of his speaking notes but there are no actual legislative amendments before us at this point so I think we are all rather uncl ear as to the specific details of those amendments.

But speaking generally, because we have enough to discuss this matter on a general basis, the first provision that we were told of that would more or less offset the failur e of the government, or the decision of the government not to provide for any sort of com pulsory binding arbitration, was the amendment that will allow, if a landlo rd refuses arbitration, the director of arbitration to impose a penalty upon the landlord in the amount of up to one month's rent. This is expressed to be in order to assist the tenant in paying moving expenses.

In his speaking notes, and I want to read this to you, it says, "provided the director of arbitration is satisfied that the reason the tenant is moving or has moved, is because the rent increase is excessive. So two things have to happen, firstly, the tenant has to decide to break the lease; and secondly, the director of arbitration has to make a decision, a dete rmination tha t the reason is tha t the rent inc rease is excessive.

In other words, he has to su bjectively somehow get involved in the case to such an extent that the director himself, or herself, could actually determine that was what motivated The Tenants Act.

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 You talked earlier about bureaucratic provisions with respect to the other Clause in the bill, 12 6, and the problems that would be entailed in dete rmining when a rent inc rease was excessive. I am wondering what you foresee will happen with respect to this section. For instance, do you think tha t the director will be inundated with requests for such penalties, for the imposition of such penalties and do you think that this is going to be bureaucratically difficult to administer?

Do you think it will be possible for the director of arbitration to fairly arbitra te this sort of matter as between a landlord and a tenant. MR. SAVINO: To tell you the truth, no. I mean, I haven't seen the legislation, none of us have, tha t is proposed in the press release. With respect to the whole issue of the director of arbitration imposing this penalty, I don't see how he is going to be able to do that, given that if the landlord posts a letter with his notice of objection the arbitrator has no authority to do anyth ing.

If the landlord objects there is no arbitration and so how is the director of arbitration goin g to come to the conclus ion that the rent inc rease was excessive if he has no authority. With respect to the leasing agreement and the breaking of the leasing agreement, tha t had better be very express in the legislation or else we are going to find some very very difficult situations where tenants bel ieve that they can get out of their lease and somebody ends up in court and finds out that the legislation isn't sufficient to do that. That has to be very express. MR.

CORRIN: In the speaking notes that we were provided, Mr. Savino, we are told that the only tenants tha t have the right to terminate signed tenancy agreements are the ones whose requested rent increases take effect up to October 1s t of this year. I am wondering whether you think tha t this provision for the tenants unilateral withdrawal, the tenants volu ntary removal from the premises will have any effect , given the fact tha t it only is going to apply with respect to rent increases that will take effect on or before October 1s t, 1980. MR. SAVINO: Quite frankly, we haven't seen this legislation.

I really can't believe tha t what is being proposed is anything more than a knee-jerk react ion to the opposition to this bill to try to cover up its deficiencies and I think in trying to cover up the deficiencies, or trying to give the appearance of covering up some of the difici encies, the Minister is creating an even greater adminis trative quagm ire than he created with the original bill.

We come back to very simple point, what the majority of tenants are conc erned about is that there will be no procedure by which they can get a binding ruling on an unjustified rent increase and, until tha t provision is changed, tenants have no protect ion. MR. CORRIN: Thank you, Mr. Savino. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Wilson. MR. ROBERT G. WILSON: Thank you for your presentation, Mr. Savino.

We on this side feel that we are going to be coming up with an arbitration and rentalsman type of operation, a department within 14 the governme nt tha t will work to alleviate the concerns of tentants with regard to rent gouging and unfair inc reases. I might have missed it, and I apolog ize for being slightly late, but you have said tha t the arbitration and rentalsman scheme tha t we have won't work, and I think I am correct in saying that they won't work and tha t they are basically sort of phoney. Are you comm itted then to rent controls vis-a-vis this syste m? MR.

SAVINO: I thought I made my position quite clear. Personally, I would be commi tted to the rete ntion of rent controls at this particular time in the housing market in Manitoba and, as we discussed with Mr. Green, when you have a situation where there is sufficient affor dable housing that people won't be gouged, then is the time that rent controls can be removed and free market forces will operate positively. I'm sorry, you wanted to interject there? MR.

WILSON: Yes, except that I wanted to, if I could at this time, inform you tha t back on May 10 of 19 76, the Honourable Ed Schreyer said tha t there was never any question about that, that the matter of rent control was tied in with the matter of anti inflation guidelines in Canada; this is a necessary part of the program and our commitment is with respect to the period of that program.

In other words, if the anti-inf la tion gu idelines have disa ppeared and we're comm itted to end the control program and, at the same time, express a concern, if what the Member for Roblin has said, that this is a unique city of Winnipeg problem, so to speak, and basically dealing a lot, in a case, with the older sections of what we call the city of Winnipeg, the old city of Winnipeg, then what I am keeping the faith in is that we are going to have an arbitration and rentalsman type system that is going to work.

I am willing to lis ten to your criticisms, that you say it contains a lot of fluf f and won't work and may be phoney, and I want to get back to the fact that here we have Ed Schreyer saying, "We're going to get out of rent control s," and then we have you saying that we should be back in them. I'm rather concerned. Do you have any criticism of what Mr. Schreyer said? MR. SAVINO: No, I have no criticism of what Mr. Schr eyer said . I would point out two observa tions: Number one, Mr. Schreyer made that observation when the New Democratic Party of Manitoba was in government.

At tha t time, the New Democratic Party had built 18 ,000 units of housing in its term in gover nment. In 19 78, at the New Democratic Party Convention, Mr. Schreyer adopted the policy position of the party and that is tha t rent controls must remain in place until there is sufficient adequ ate affordable housing for all Manitobans. That was the policy position then and it changed in the intervening period of time because the Conservatives stopped the construction of public housing. MR. WILSON: Thank you. MR. CHAIRM AN: Mr. Green. MR. GREEN: Mr.

Savino, there was one point, and maybe I wasn't in the room for the entire time. There has been some suggestion that the tenants need in

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 1e legislation, and this always bothers me a little bit, >me right of col lective bargai ning. Is there anything tat you now kno w of which prevents, by law, :nants from engaging in collective bargaining with teir landlord? IR. SAVINO: The repeal of The Rent Stabilization et, because I have seen it happen with people that I 10w in my neighbourhood. The people who are the ;tivists in the block, who organize - and you've Jen it, I'm sure, Mr. Green, in trade unions - are scrimina ted against by rece iving the highest rent creases or the most number of hassles. IR.

GREEN: But is there a law which takes away om them the right of col lective bar gaining? ollective bargaining, I am talking about, because arnell bargained col lectively on behalf of the Irish !nants in the mid-1 850s without a law giving him 1y right to collective barga ining, and the unions that )U are talking about bargained for many years ithout some law giving them the right to collective argaining. As a matter of fact, their problems :arted when politicians started to give them laws uara nteeing these rights, which actually took them Nay.

Right now, what prevents a group of tenants from oing to their landlord, all of them, and saying that, If the rents go up, we are not going to pay them nd we are going to stand outside your block with tgns urging people not to rent these premises ." /hat law prevents them from doing that? IR. SAVINO: The Landlord and Tenant Act. IR. GREEN: How does it prevent them? IR. SA VINO: Because they would be evicted for ot paying the rent demanded by the landlord, which ; a legal rent because there is no control on the �nt. IR. GREEN: Mr.

Savino, there was never a law aying that an empl oyer could not di smis s an mployee , but nevert heless the emplo yee and the ·ade union said, "You dismiss us and we will stand utside your plant; we will urge other people not to ,uy from you," and what Parnell did, he said, "We rill go to the sheriff's sales and urge people not to 'uy the goods that are distrained in rent ," and all of 1is was done 10 0 years ago, before any politicians 1ought of a right to collective bargai ning. And it rorked, by the way. �R. SA VINO: Well, it may work again, too. �R. GREEN: Okay, don't say that it won't. �R.

SAVINO: But what I am pointing out, Mr. ireen, is that, in that kind of a situation, it would be legal not to pay your rent and you could be taken to ourt, and your could lose your tenancy. �R. GREEN: There is no doub t that a person who lecides tha t he is going to go on strike could lose tis job. Col lective bargaining always implied that.

A enant who decides that he is going to defy his rental tgreement could lose his suite, but if they bargain :ol lectively and they say that, "We are going to 15 stand together and we are going to ask other tenants not to accept premises in this place," the landlord will have second thoughts about imposing tho se rents. That's the meaning of col lective bargai ning. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. McKenzie, did you wish to MR. McKENZIE: Mr. Savino, these amendments that you are proposing here today, should they apply across the whole of the province of Manitoba? MR.

SAVINO: Well, you have already exempted the rural part of the province from controls. These provisions would apply only in those situations where units are presently under controls or have been decontrol led through the ausp ices of the Rent Stabilization Board. I am not sure, from the reports tha t have been tabled, what the rental situation is in the country. Apparently, it is not as bad. That being the case, these provisions would probably only apply to the city. MR. McKENZIE: The other question I have, Mr.

Chairman, is you mentioned several times in your explana tory notes on Page 1 that rent inc rease is inconscionable and that would be difficult, and you mention again on Page 2, and then on Page 4, you mention something about it, that it might be in the old Act, the word "unconscionable." Have you got a definition for that, because I don't think we could live with that in

an Act; it would have to be spelled out. What is an unconscionable rent inc rease? MR. SAVINO: Well, you tell me, Mr. McKenzie. Your government passed that piece of legislation that used the term "unconscionable." As I indicated, the board is to have a very difficult time to dete rmine what is an unconscionable rent increase. Mr. Silverman and Mr. Jorgenson have both said that they are confident that landlords won't increase the rents more than 10 percent.

If they are so confident, then why don't they make that the bottom line, that rents will increase by a maximum of 10 percent and if you want to increase above 10 percent, you go through the very fair proced ure of justifying those increases before a public tribunal. MR. McKENZIE: Am I assu ming, then, that it will be differe nt, every situation could be different? You couldn't take a broad figure and place it in there, rather than the word "unconscionable," 15 percent, 20 percent, or a figure of that nature, or have you have got a figure? MR.

SAVINO: lt leaves a lot of dis cretion up to the people who are admin istering the Act, is what it does. MR. McKENZIE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Malinowski. MR. DONALD MALINOWSKI: Thank you. I would like to ask you about the letters which you are read ing to us, and also the petitions which are you tabling. Are they from a certain part of the city, or from the whole of Winnipeg, or more than Winnipeg?

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 MR. SAVINO: They are all from Winnipeg. The majority of them are from the area in which I li ve, that is the Fort Rouge area which, of course, has the highe st concentration of tenants in the province. But there are, you will observe in looking at the petitions, signatures from all over the city, and particular blocks in the city that are experiencing incredibly high rent incr eases. MR. MALINOWSKI: But nothing like from Brandon or Dauphin, or any other cities? MR.

SAVINO: I haven't received any correspondence from Brandon but it may be tha t some of the other speakers that will come before this comm ittee will have some thing on that. MR. MALINOWSKI: Thank you. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very kindly, Mr. Sa vino. MR. SAVINO: Thank you, Mr . Chairman , and members of the commit tee. MR. CHAIRMAN: The second person, Hilda Peiluck. Is Hilda Peiluck avai lable? (No response.) Tom Wojcikowski. (No response.) Janet Paxton. Is Janet Paxton here? (No response.) M. Dolin from Klinic. Mr. Corrin. MR.

CORRIN: Yes, I am just wondering, in view of the fact that some of these people now seem to be missing, could we be advised, Mr. Chairman, whether the Clerk was successful in notifying these people, in the time between yeste rday evening at 10 :30 and commencement of the meeting? Could we find out which of these people the Clerk actually could contact, because there hasn't been much time. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Corrin, the Clerk's office did their very best to telephone all these people.

What we have decided to do is that if a person isn't present when I call their name, they just go to the bottom of the list and we just keep working down the list. The only names that will be stricken are those that have made a presenta tion, until we run out of people wishing to make presentations. We will do every thing as a commit tee to giv e each and every person a fair opportunity. The next person is an A.W. Mudge. Mr. Mudge. MR. A.W. MUDGE: We were speaking of signatures; Mr. Mali nowski asked tor some. I have 1, 550 here and they are from ... I must say I didn't collect them all myself. MR.

CHAIRMAN: Before you carry on, may I ask you if you are repres enting yourself or are you representing a group. MR. MUDGE: No, I am representing myself, Sir, as a private individuaL Another question Mr. Malino wski asked was, were they all from Winnipeg? Most of these are, from various parts of Winnipeg, not just one area. They cover pretty well all of Winnipeg. So I will table these for your information. 16 First of all, Mr. Chairman, and honour able members, allow me to thank you for this opportunity to speak on Bill 83.

I would like to present some reasons why I feel that this bill should not be passed in its present form. I have already tabled 1 ,500-odd signatu res of people who feel exactly the same as I do. lt has been said that Bill 83 sounds as if it has been dra fted by The Landlord's Association and I must agree because, Mr . Chairman, it contai ns absolutely no protection for tenants. For years, landlords have been actively working towards the erosion of tenants' rights and it looks as though they are at last succe eding.

The right to appeal an excessive rent incr ease, as it is laid out in Bill 83, means nothing, since the landlord must agree to arbitration. We have alr eady been over that point several times this afternoon. Naturally, no land lord is going to submit to arbitration which will lower his eventual income. lt is highly unlikely that the Minister will order binding arbitration in most cases, when you consider his track record thus far.

Lately, there have been suggestions from the government tha t some amen dme nts will be made, but so far nothing concrete has come out that will giv e tenants some relief from this bilL lt has been suggested that the disgruntled tenant move, but at today's prices, anyone with any amount of furniture and personal posses sions, say someone living in a th ree or four room suite, or seven or eight room house, is looking at some thing between 500 and 1, 000 just to move across the city, and I know this for a fact from personal experience.

As far as this amendment that will allow or force a landlord to giv e the tenant one month's rent towards his move, it's not very much. Another question arises in my mind, how are you going to force the landlord to do this? My experience with landlords is it's pretty hard to force them to do anything they don't want. So the tenant will probably accept the incr ease and learn to liv e with it if it's at all possible. Now landlords are fully aware of this situation and many of them are going to take advantage of it to their own advantage.

For th ose on fixed incomes, the elderly, the sick, the blind, th e disabled, and others who are disadvanta ged in our society, it will be worse. Some pensioners have already received inc reases of up to 50 percent. Where, Mr. Chairman, are they going to turn? Can an 81 -year-old man be expected to go out and find a job in order to pay the 71 a month increase on his rent, or is he simply going to reduce his other expenditur es or perhaps even swallow his pride and go to welfare? Does the government have an answer for this man? I doubt it very much.

Ever since this government came to power, the poor, the sick, and elderly, and others unable to fight for thems elves have been victims of the restraint program, while those who drafted the program, as well as their political friends have - well let's just say the rich got rich and the poor got poorer. I recall a couple of years ago when one of the government members who had a large

part in drafting the restraint program announced that he was happy with the progress of the program. I asked him publicly then, and I pose the same question again, if the people who patron ize his posh hotels

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 d been affected by the restraint program to the ect where they had to reduce that patronage, 1uld he have been so happy? My point, Sir, is that from the time the present vernment took power it has waged war, in the me of rest raint, on those least able to fight back. single example, among the many that come to nd, was when Mr. Lyon announced that he was ving 40,000 by cutting out a da y camp for derpri vileged childr en in the core area; and then a N weeks later created a position of executive sistant for a political friend at the salary of ',500.00. This is rest raint?

And I say, those least 'le to fend for thems elves have all along been the :tims of the restraint program, and Bill 83, Mr. 1airman, is just another giant step in the same ·ection. Let's talk for a moment about The Landlord and �nant Act. Manitoba's Act, gentlemen, is one of the �st in existence but is being greatly downgraded by 11 83. In it's present form it is reasonably fair to 1th sides. Some landlords claim that it is unfair to em and that the Rentalsman always seems to vour tenants, however, this is just not true. But, Bill I puts the shoe squa rely on the other foot.

For stance, a landlord will be able to evict a tenant for 1y number of reasons without a court order, thus moving the tenants right to contest an unfair rict ion.

Examples would be where a tenant is :casionally and unavoidably late with the rent; 1ere a tenant complains about conditions in the ock, however justified; if the landlo rd should tppen to dislike a tenant for personal reasons he 11 be given short shrif t with no ch ance to appeal; if land lord deci des to convert his block to a >ndominium he will be able to evict on short notice ose tenants who do not wish to buy their suite. ready some elderly persons who have liv ed in the tme place for years are faced with this problem as ndlords jump the gun. If Bill 83 is passed gentlemen, what rights will mants have?

None tha t I can see of any msequence. Further, if and when the landlords in is province get their blacklist organized, excuse me eir referral system, tenants who do not mind their anners will find it difficult to find accommodation 1ywhere and will no doubt be denied access to this e, another example of democr acy at work in a free 1terprise system. You may wonder, Mr. Chairman, at my seeming 1tipathy towards landlords. it's a result, Sir, of 3ing a tenant most of my adult life and having to 3al with grasping landlords.

Not all of them are that ay but many of them are and it's showing up now > they anticipa te the passing of Bill 83. I would like , cite a personal experience which backs up my )ntention that Bill 83, should be withdrawn. In the )ring of 19 75 I moved into a highrise in North ildonan . I sublet from a senior citizen at the lduced rate he was enjoying because, as the 1anager said to him, I have 30 vacant one-bedroom Jit es now and I don't want any more so she ouldn't allow him to get out of his lease.

Knowing that rent controls were in the offing I usted that The Rent Stabilization Act would protect 1e from a hefty increase. When I received my new �ase I found that not only had the rent been djusted to the regular rate plus the 10 percent 17 allo wed by the board, but that another 7 or 8 percent had been added on. The Rent Review Board disa llowed all but the 10 percent. The landlord appealed but the Rent Review Appeal Board turned him down. He then proceeded to take the Rent Review Board to court, contending that he had not had a fair hearing.

The case dragged on for months and he lost it, whereupon he appealed but lost again and was finally ordered to rebate the extra rent he had all along been collecting. He stalled, making various excuses, until the board finally set a date beyond which he would penal ized if he did not pay the rebate and we finally received our money, about a year and a half after it all started. He was ordered to pay us interest but he never did and he never will.

Two years ago in the summer of 19 78, when I received my lease, I found that the Rent Review Board had granted him - we are still talking about the same landlord by the way - equalization so he was finally able to adjust all rents upward to the same level. Incidentally this landlord was the only one at that time tha t was granted this privilege of equalization, so one has to wonder why. He was allo wed to equalize and was given the allowable incr ease and because of his financial statement to the board was allo wed another 5 or 6 percent. This produced a whopping 48 percent incr ease on my suite so I appealed.

The Appeal Board decided to review the rent structure for the whole block rather than just my suite and at this point the landlord attempted to buy me off. He made me an offer which I couldn't refuse, that is until I talked to my lawyer and he said no, don't do it because under The Rent Stabilization Act it's ill egal for a landlord and tenant to enter into an agreement outside the Act. So, of course, had I taken the offer, once the time had gone by for me to appeal the landlord could have just said shove it, and I would have had no recourse. As I say they decided to review the rent structure for the whole block.

My lawyer discovered a number of discrepanc ies in the la ndlord's rep resented expenses and brought them to the attention of the board which in turn uncovered more duplicity and, in short, I won the appeal. Incidentally this land lord owns about 20 or so highri ses and another 100 or 200 townhouses and appeals were going on at the same time in several of his highrises and the tenants won them all. The landlord was ordered to roll back the rents and give us our rebates. That was two years ago, Mr. Chairman, and to date we have not received any money.

We have not received our rebates, and the rents have not been rolled back. Obviously, somebody is holding back until Bill 83 is passed and The Rent Stabi lization Act is dissolved. The Rent Stabilization Board has already been cut in half the other day, and they get rid of the rest of them and then there will be no Rent Review Board to bother this landlord, so the problem will solve itself by disappearing and the landlord will have thousands and thousands of dollars of his tenants money to keep.

Anyway, by now, most of those living in the block involved have moved and he doesn't know where they are because, in some cases, and I know personally of several, the manager refused to accept the departing tenants forward ing address; so of course they don't know where these people are, and that of course was not an oversight, it was done

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 deli berately. Even if he was ordered to make rebates which he may yet be, we don't know, a lot of these people will never see their money. He has been collecting rents in excess of what he was allowed on upwards of 1, 000 suites for almost two years, and also adding the allowable inc rease last year and this year on the original infla ted figure. The present government, Mr. Chairman, is not doing a damn thing about it except passing Bill 83 which will give him compl ete freed om. Is this democra cy in action? Incide ntally, in all honesty, I must admit tha t I was finally evicted.

Right from the time I questioned the new lease in the summer of 19 75, I was a mar ked man. On a number of occasions I received an eviction notice when I happened to be a little late with the rent, but I would ignore it. One time he did take me to court to get an order of possession and I beat him. In December of 19 78 he took me to court again and he won on a legal technicality. I appealed and I lost again so I moved out.

Now you might say he was justified if I was late with the rent occasionally, although it was never more than a couple of weeks at a time, but once a couple of years ago his rental manager stated publicly that at any given time approximately one-third of their 6,000 tenants were in arrears, and she did not deny this when it was mentioned in court. I have to wonder why they were not all turfed out the way I was. The answer of course is simple.

I was a trou blemaker just because I demanded my rights under The Rent Stabili zation Act and The Landlord and Tenant Act, and since this particular landlord does not believe tenants have any rights they had to get rid of me before I infected too many other tenants with my philo sophy.

As far as the legal technicality, was that one order of the Rent Review Board, on an adjustment of rent - I owed the landlord 107. 00. 1t took me all of th ree weeks to pay that, but in the meantime the court action was held and the court held that I should have paid it within th ree days and that therefore I had been in arrears and the landlord was given an order of possession, so that's what happened there. The saying that there is one law for the rich and another for the poor is certainly justified in that case. As I said, this landlord considers that his tenants have no rights.

He has constantly been at odds with his tenants through the Rentalsman and the Rent Review Board and indeed at odds with the Review Board itself on occasion. He uses his tenants money and pays no interest on it. He has falsified his records, and this is on the papers, this is a fact, to obtain a higher increase than that set by the Act. He almost never returns the damage deposit without a fight and, in fact, somebody at the Rentalsman office told me that they had a lot of trouble with this particular landlord on that account. The list of counts against this man is endless.

He once sent an elderly couple who had moved out, a bill for 200 for redecorating their suite. This was over an above the dama ge deposit which he had not returned yet. They went to the Rent Review Board and the officer they conta cted called the rental agent, the rental manager, and informed her that she couldn't do that - of course she knew that already. The upshot was that the bill was cancelled and the da mage deposit repaid in full. One has to wonder however how many 18 times this trick was pulled in the past and succeeded. Frankly, gentlemen, I have no use for those who prey on the elderly.

Of course an incident like that, when exposed, is passed off as a clerical error, but who believes that. And in case you are wondering how I know about this, the Rent Review officer himself that handled the case told me, so I have to assume it's true. In my business I have talked with literally hundr eds of tenants over the past few years and have found that this particular landlord is not alone in his infamy. Others, before rent controls were imposed, were raising the rent every th ree months in order to have a higher base to work on when rent controls did ev entually come in.

Some neglect repairs and maintenance and when the tenants complain, they are told, "If you don't like it, move out." In fact, that's what a lot of tenants are hearing right now when they are protesting the high rent increases that will take effect October 1s t. Some, and I know personally of sev eral, caring nothing for The Landlord and Tenant Act except when it favors them, will enter suites without a tenant's permission, change locks on the suite as soon as they are a few days in arrears, and even remove their belongings and lock them away, all of which is strictly illegal, but somehow they get away with it.

Many, of course, refuse to return the damage deposit until the Rentalsman orders them to do so, then they retain part of it as a cleaning fee, whether the suite needed cleaning or not which, again, is ill egal under The Landlord and Tenant Act. My point in telling you all this, Mr. Chairman, is twofol d. First, to show that I know whereof I speak, through personal experience, and secondly, to show that landlords like this cannot be trus ted if Bill 83 is passed and rent controls leave them free to do as they please.

The government has said that landlords have agreed that increases will be minimal if they are allo wed to operate without controls, but many of them have already given lie to that statement. Mr. Chairman, Bill 83 can only further demoral ize th ose who have been oppressed by this government's rest raint program. One gentleman, the manager of a government agency, was reported as saying, "Few renters are likely to hurt as controls end." Well, it's about time for him to wake up and smell the coffee, because already there are reported increases as high as 50 percent.

And when the increase is 71. 00, from 139.00, up to 21 0.00, tha t does hurt, especially when the tenant is over 80 years of age. I know that this government wants to get out of controls, Mr. Chairman, but it must be do ne humanely. Incidently, it is rather an anomoly, I think, the government wants to get out of controls but they are talking about an arbitration board. You can't have both. You either are in controls or you are out of them, one of the other, com pletely. I can't see how the two are compatible.

Those who will be hur t most by Bill 83 have already been hurt by runaway inflation and can only be hurt more by the effect of Bill 83. I know from experience how a few dolla rs a month added to your already overloaded budg et can topple it. I, at least,

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 can still work , and work a few extra hours, if necessary, to get a little extra money, but what about the elderly, the sick, the disabled, what are they going to do? Under Bill 83, landlords will be free to try and recoup what they feel they lost under controls. In fact, it is obvious that many of them are already doing that. In fact, it was in the paper last night. The Minister himself adm itted that some of them are trying to do this. But it must not be allo wed to happen because the effect will be to add to already infla tionary levels.

If it is al lowed to happen, Sir, The Rent Stabil ization Act will have served no useful purpose. Throughout the time of control, landlords would have us bel ieve that many of them went broke as a result. In fact, if one were to bel ieve the figures quo ted at one point by the president of the Landlord's Association, there would eventually be no rental accommodation in Manitoba because it would all have been abandoned by bankrupt owners. Of course, Mr.

Chairman, this gentleman's credibility leaves much to be desired whenever he speaks out on behalf of his associa tion. lt is true that some landlords were caught with their rents down when controls were imposed, and perhaps some even went under, but I suggest, Sir, tha t in any event, they might have been among the hund reds of businessmen who go bankrupt every year in Manitoba for a variety of reasons. I don't think it is fair to blame it on rent controls, as many landlords are doing. As you know, Sir, there are a small num ber of landlords who control the largest part of the rental market.

Several of these have already hit their tenants with large inc reases, to the point where some of the elderly renters on fixed incomes are desperate and have no idea which way to turn. In fact, there are stories of seeing elderly people crying in the hal lways, and I can well belie ve that because I have seen it myself a few years ago when this landlord I spoke of before started to raise his rents. One elderly lady got a 75.00 increase and she didn't know what she was going to do. So I can bel ieve that the same thing is happening again to some of these elderly people.

If Bill 83 is passed, what is to prevent these landlo rds, these ha lf-dozen or so, from getting together and agreeing to, say, a 30 percent incr ease in all their blocks, and especially where they control, like the Roslyn Road area and areas like that where th ey control 75 to 85 percent of the accommodation, what is to prevent them getting together and setting this 30 percent increase or whatever they want? This will comple tely invalida te the

section of the bill that has been discussed already today, that deals with arb itration and compar es rent increases in one block, any given block, with rent incr eases in the area. In fact, Sir, as I said at the beginning, there is nothing at all in Bill 83 for tenants, but there is a possibility of a windfall for landlords. In fact, in my opinion, Bill 83 is a lic ence to print money.

Since Bill 83 can only reap hardship on those in our society least able to help themselves, I ask you, gentlemen, to search your hearts and, in all conscience, withdraw Bill 83 and replace it with more equitable legislation. 19 In closing, Mr. Chairm an and honourable mem bers, I want to thank you again for your attention and remind you that 19 81 is not far away and that there are far more tenants in Manitoba than there are landlords. Thank you very much. MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Mr. Mudge, for your presenta tion. Would you answer questions, if there are questions? MR. MUDGE: I will if I can, Sir.

Don't throw anything technical at me; I'm not a lawyer. MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Barrow. MR. THOMAS BARROW: I enjoyed his speech very much. I think he really lays it on the line and it cuts the bone of the matter; it's the tenant that is taking the beating. You mentioned you won your case with that block after he raised the rents, and you won your case. MR. MUDGE: I won the appeal case, yes. MR. BARROW: Yes, but for two years, nothing happened. The raises still went on ... ? MR. MUDGE: lt's a bit of a difficult situation to talk about, sir, because it is still before the courts. I am going to take a chance.

We are not supposed to talk publicly about what is before the courts, but I am going to take a chance and explain that he took the Rent Review Board to court again, as he had previously, and it dra gged on until April 8th this year, alm ost two years, when we finally appeared in court, myself and the Rent Review Board. The judge reserved his decision. That was three months ago, Sir, and that decision has not been handed down yet. Why? MR. BARROW: And you are still paying the high rate of rent? MR.

MUDGE: The people there are still paying the inflated rent, plus last year's incr ease, plus this year's inc rease, on top of the rent that was supposed to be rolled back. MR. BARROW: So, if the case is in your favor, you will gain all this retroactive. MR. MUDGE: Retroactive, yes, if the case was . . . But here again, and maybe I'm speaking out of turn because it is still before the courts, but it has come up so I'll take a chance again, it is my opinion that if - I'm not saying who it is but I' m sure that some of you have gue ssed already - if the judge ...

Usually a judge giv es down his decision in a week or two. This has been held for as long as - over three months. Now, I am convinced, gentlemen, and I'm sticking my neck out when I say this, but I am convinced that this judge has been asked , or told, to reserve the decision until after Bill 83 goes through, by which time there will be no Rent Review Board. So if he does find in favor of the Rent Review Board and ours elves and orders the Rent Review Board to give him another hearing, or orders him to rebate the rents, if he orders the Review Board to giv e him

Wednesday, 16 July, 1980 another hearing, there will be no Review Board. If he orders the landlord that the Rent Review Board acted properly and that th erefore the landlord has to abide by the Rent Review Board's decision, who is going to enforce that? There will be no Rent Review Board left and the only person that might enforce that would be the Attorney-General, and I don't have too much faith there, frankly. But as I say, I am sticking my neck out by talking about this but I am not a lawyer so they can't hold me i

Document details

Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	31-4-sro2
Type	hansard
Volume / chapter	31st 4th hansardpdf sro2.pdf
Language	en
Format	pdf
Source	PROVINCIAL
Identifier	df273af6e8cdfbca9fb8c3d472edeefb1c6e3112

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