UNPRECEDENTED SOLIDARITY
The auto-evict petition, signed by 33,335 people as of this writing, and now making headline news on national (even international) venues like CBC and CTV, is one of the most significant displays of housing provider solidarity witnessed within the Ontario rental property community.
I don’t know of another instance in the history of Ontario’s rental housing community where so many housing providers have united around a single, common objective, and one that is elegant and easily implementable.
IT’S NOW OR NEVER – ACT NOW OR FOREVER HOLD YOUR PEACE
You … not me or any other reader … you, have a unique—perhaps once in a lifetime—opportunity to take advantage of this momentum and visibility.
I know firsthand that the Ministry of Housing is well-aware of the petition, although it has not officially made any comment.
Please let me know when you are meeting, or have met, with your MPP.
If no one meets with their MPPs about this petition then I will remove myself from this process. Perhaps someone else will pick it up and run with the petition in that case but I wouldn't plan to be involved.
Please don't take this as an ultimatum. It's simply a matter of me not being able to do this alone. Complacency and the unwillingness of housing providers to speak up or, more importantly, to act, is a big part of how we collectively got into this mess in the first place.
It's also a big part of the government's ongoing success to deflect away from itself and on to housing providers the government's culpability for the housing shortage crisis and the high rent rates that were created by the government's decades-long failed housing policies.
The government relies heavily upon your complacency as well as their strategy of "divide and conquer."
ONLY AN MPP CAN INTRODUCE A PETITION
Before considering a class action against the province for a few billion dollars, it behooves us to collectively give the province an opportunity to address the petition, of which it has been entirely silent to date, even after being asked for comment by the media.
We achieve the moral, and perhaps legal, high ground if we have made every effort to have our grievance heard through political channels before taking more drastic action.
To do that, it’s in all of our interests to find one or more MPPs who will present the petition to the provincial legislature. I believe they don’t even have to identify themselves as supporting it.
Only an MPP (and excluding cabinet ministers) can submit and present a petition to the legislature, either under their own name or anonymously.
As part of the routine proceedings in the provincial legislature each day, there is a window of time dedicated to the tabling of petitions
- An MPP can rise and give a brief description of the petition and why the change is needed, as well as the number of signatures and the organizer.
- If the petition is sensitive or the MPP is unwilling to present it themselves in the legislature, the MPP can file it directly through the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.
- The government is required to respond to a petition in writing within 24 sitting days. Generally, the responses are very noncommittal but it does acknowledge the issue
Once the petition has been submitted, we can pull the video recording and use it to continue to promote the petition's message.
MPPs have an obligation to meet all their constituents who ask for a meeting, even if they or their political party disagree with the meeting agenda. This is a fundamental quality of democracy, which is glaringly absent in the matter addressed by the petition.
ASK YOUR MPP FOR A MEETING (don’t bother with an “ignorable” email)
Meeting with your local MPP is the very best thing you can do today to move this issue forward with the government.
- If your MPP doesn't agree with the petition, first, of course, ask them why.
- Then ask how they would solve the issue.
- Don’t be sidetracked by the party line that the LTB is addressing the LTB delays. These delays are a symptom, not the root issue, of your plight.
- The issue is fundamentally about a breach of a contract not honoured by a tenant. The government has a legal responsibility to administer justice as defined by contract law, especially a contract authored by the province.
- Ask your MPP what they’re going to do when more and more of the 522,000 small housing providers (not companies) in Ontario take their rental properties off the market, especially second suites, which are typically the most affordable rental units available.
Appended below is a 3-minute speech I gave recently at an MPP’s round table on tenant and housing provider issues. You might use it as pointers for your discussion.
I’d also be happy to participate by speakerphone (or Zoom) with you when you speak with your MPP if you feel it appropriate or if your MPP wants to know more or to discuss a mutually-satisfactory solution that they could support.
I’M DOING MY PART – YOU DO YOURS
I have a meeting scheduled with my MPP, Laura Smith (PC Party) on Friday April 05, 2024 to discuss the petition.
We need tens of meetings with multiple MPPs if you want to see any meaningful change.
TENANT REBUTTALS
I’ve seen the following rebuttal arguments to the auto-evict petition from tenant advocates. Here are my responses:
NAME CALLING (the petition is “obscene,” etc.)
- This is always a good sign. The uttering party doesn’t have a viable legal or moral counterargument and instead resorts to debasement, supposed moral indignation and other intangible emotional buttons rather than engage in objective reasoning and good faith discussions, and employing established statistics and precedents from other jurisdictions
TENANT RIGHTS MAY BE LESSENED
- The party never explains what those rights are or how this petition specifically infringes, lessens or inhibits those rights
- Tenants do not have the right to not pay their rent
- The auto-evict petition deals solely with tenants who have not paid their rent, which terms and conditions were agreed to between the housing provider and tenant, using the government’s crafted and legislatively-imposed residential tenancy agreement
DON’T USE BRITISH COLUMBIA’S LEGISLATION AS A BASELINE MODEL
- No explanation is ever provided for why, except perhaps that it makes it easier to evict tenants
- Our petition requires the legislation to go further than B.C.'s established process since Ontario adjudicators would still otherwise delay for no legal reason, uncontested judgements for many months or write a schedule of repayment order that's rarely honoured by the tenant but which delays the eviction for several additional months.
MAKES IT EASIER FOR HOUSING PROVIDERS TO EVICT A TENANT
- Uuhm … yes, that’s exactly what it is supposed to do. The party doesn't explain why this is supposedly wrong.
- The petition is demanding a simpler, quicker and more cost-effective means to evict tenants who have breached their provincially-written standard residential tenancy agreement
- Tenants have a contractual obligation to pay their rent on the day that it is due, in full and by the agreed-upon method … as guaranteed by contract law, as administered under common law, and as guaranteed by the government’s laws and judicial body(s)
- All rent-paying tenants are being victimized by their non-rent-paying counterparts (and the government) with the consequent rapid shrinkage in rental property availability, and the then consequent rapidly increasing rent rates for the remaining few properties.
NO OPPORTUNITY TO APPEAL FOR “EXTENUATING” CIRCUMSTANCES
- Private sector residential housing providers are NOT an extension of the government’s social housing agenda and programs. Some housing providers might consider participating voluntarily in a social housing scheme if government incentives were there, the program was voluntary, and perhaps if rent payments were guaranteed.
- The RTA already provides an N4 14-day notice. Tenants have the opportunity during this time to seek a good faith solution with the housing provider. Failing that, they would have their last month’s rent deposit to apply (45 days total) and then a further 30 days after that before the auto-eviction is automatically executed.
- If a tenant can’t pay the rent because they’ve fallen on temporary difficult times, it's still a breach of contract. Extenuating circumstances would have to be explicitly defined, very limited and precise in scope, and be made immune to “abuse of process” (which is rampant in today’s LTB hearings).
- When dealing with mortgages, a lender can only invoke a power of sale after they send a formal warning. The homeowner then has 35 days to pay back what is owed ("redemption period") to stop the power of sale. To my knowledge, the law does not consider "extenuating circumstances" for non-payment of a residential (homeowner or rental), or any other type of, mortgage.
RENT WITHHELD BECAUSE OF MAINTENANCE
- Several LTB brochures clearly and unambiguously state, “Do not withhold rent - A tenant should not withhold any part of the rent, even if the tenant feels that maintenance is poor or a necessary repair has not been done. A landlord can apply to evict a tenant if the full rent is not paid on time.”
- LTB Brochure - Maintenance and Repairs:
- https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/Brochures/Maintenance%20and%20Repairs%20(EN).pdf
- LTB Brochure: A Guide to the Residential Tenancies Act
- https://tribunalsontario.ca/documents/ltb/Brochures/Guide%20to%20RTA%20(English).html
- The LTB has twisted a section of the RTA to get around the spirit and intent of the law and its own pronouncement son on the RTA by compelling LTB adjudicators to embrace “every possible” consideration in their deliberation, including maintenance, despite its own brochures
- Withholding rent is not only illegal but amounts to extortion. A tenant is holding a housing provider’s livelihood, their investment and the property for ransom
- Withholding rent for “maintenance issues” has been extremely abused and exploited ad nauseum by tenants, their advocates and their legal representatives for many years, with the complicity of the LTB
- Separate laws abound to address maintenance issues:
- Significant remedies and penalties are already provided in the RTA
- Every municipality has property standard by-laws and by-law enforcement officers paid for by property taxes (etc.), specifically to address such issues
- Toronto has gone to extraordinary lengths in attacking its housing providers for supposed property standards violations
- Texas (USA) state law has an excellent balance for handling maintenance by-law and property standards complaints. A tenant has to first prove that they paid their rent in full and on time. THEN the tenant can file a maintenance complaint, after which the by-law officer will immediately follow up.
MEDIA COVERAGE TO DATE
CTV – print and video (March 24/24)
CBC – print and video (March 22/24)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-landlords-eviction-petition-1.7151130
Canadian Apartment magazine – March 22/24)
https://www.reminetwork.com/articles/30000-ontario-landlords-unite-against-failing-ltb/
940 CFPL – Mike Stubbs (March 25/24)
https://globalnews.ca/london/program/london-live
580 CFRA – Kristy Cameron (March 22/24, hour 1)
https://omny.fm/shows/580-cfra/hour-1-of-ottawa-now-for-fri-march-22nd-2024?in_playlist=ottawa-now
TikTok Video · Christian Moretuzzo · 298,600+ views · 8,300+ Likes, 3,645 Comments
(Error in speaker's presentation. Speaker states housing providers want sheriff-like powers, which is not correct.)
https://www.tiktok.com/@christianmoretuzzo/video/7338927026243472645
MPP Billy Pang Roundtable – 3-minute speech given at landlord-tenant issues roundtable
Yahoo News Canada
Yahoo News U.K.
MSN
Elite Agent magazine
https://eliteagent.com/canadian-landlords-call-for-automatic-eviction-rights/
Red Flag Deals Forum
Rental Housing Business (RHB)
SPEECH GIVEN TO MPP ROUNDTABLE ON TENANT-HOUSING PROVIDER ISSUES
I’m here today to speak on behalf of over 1,000 [deleted] constituents who signed a petition with over 31,000 others to demand a desperately-needed change at Ontario’s Landlord and Tenant Board.
There are over 37,000 LTB applications currently outstanding to terminate a residential tenancy for non-payment of rent. This represents 41.5% of all the applications submitted.
The average wait time to recover a rental property from a non-rent-payment tenant is about a year, during which time the tenant does not pay rent. The average loss is roughly estimated at about $25,000 per applicant which equates to about $1 billion annually … and there’s no practical recourse in Ontario to recover rent arrears.
Small-to-medium housing providers are taking back their second suites, which are generally the most affordable rental units available, and selling their single-family homes and condo rentals. They’re fearful that they could end up with a non-rent-paying or property-damaging tenant. No one wants to invest in a rental property when they could lose their life savings, retirement income, their own home, go bankrupt or even end up homeless.
This explains why Ontario is the only province in 2023 that experienced a net loss of 6,548 rental units despite building 94,000 new homes.
The LTB delays also empower tenants to extort “cash for keys” in amounts as high as $100,000 in order to return possession of a property that rightfully belongs to the housing provider.
If housing providers knew that a tenant could be evicted for non-payment of rent within 30 days, for example, then:
- Tens of thousands of second suites could come on the market in just a few months because housing providers would know that their investment is protected by the law;
- It would be much easier for a tenant to qualify since housing providers would not have to be so defensive in their qualification process;
- Tenant LTB applications that are also been stuck in the same delay queue would be significantly expedited.
95% of all the residential housing in Canada was built by the private sector. Literally half of those are owned and operated by “unincorporated individuals,” meaning small-to-medium size housing providers, not companies.
It takes three to five years to bring each high-capacity housing project to the market. Then they struggle to find construction labour and affordable materials. Even then, rents must reflect the high cost of construction so new units are always more expensive than existing rentals.
The ONLY source of new housing that can meet the immediate demand of affordable rental housing in Ontario are small-to-medium housing providers who are willing to open their homes as well as buy houses and condos to rent out.
That will only happen if government guarantees to protect that investment, which it has catastrophically failed to do for many years.
Fix the LTB eviction process and many current issues will resolve themselves, while new opportunities will flow from it.
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There can be no peace without justice.
Chris.