The Non-profit Housing Co-operatives Statute Law Amendment Act, 2013 (Bill 14) unanimously passed Third Reading on September 24, and received Royal Assent on September 26. The main feature of the Act is that it amends the Co-operative Corporations Act and the Residential Tenancies Act to allow co-op housing evictions to proceed at a statutory tribunal, the Landlord & Tenant Board, rather than before the courts. It is expected that the amendments will come into force within a period of 6 to 9 months, giving the Landlord & Tenant Board the opportunity to absorb the influx of new cases. The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing has itself anticipated a significant increase in co-op eviction cases that will be heard by the Landlord & Tenant Board.

This year NLS is marking its 40th year of providing legal services to the low income residents of Toronto’s downtown east side. Only a few in the community now will recall that day in 1973 when the clinic opened its door in a house on Seaton Street. While the community has changed and continues to change in what is really a process of continual renewal, the basic legal needs the clinic addresses have not changed much. Fighting through the Courts and Tribunals, through law reform campaigns and through outreach and public legal education for better and more secure housing, better and more secure incomes and more secure status in Canada for immigrants and their families has been the mainstay of our work throughout the past 4 decades. 

In a lengthy 52 page decision released on Friday, September 6, Mr. Justice Thomas Lederer of the Superior Court of Ontario dismissed the landmark ‘Right to Housing’ case that had been brought by the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario (ACTO) and other housing and homelessness advocates.

The following blog is provided courtesy of John Bonnar and rabble.ca. You can find the original, which appeared in rabble.ca on June 4, 2013, by clicking here. 

When Sacha Proctor received a notice from his landlord that his rent would increase 17.6 per cent on May 1, he tried to move to a similar unit with a lower price tag in the same building.

“But they refused to meet with us,” he said. 

“The refused to tell us why we got the high increase, refused to let us transfer to a cheaper unit or what other similar units were renting for.”