The New Brunswick Coalition for Tenants Rights is dismayed to learn that a time-consuming legislative amendment is required for the cap to take effect. This announcement comes after assurances that the 3.8% rent cap would be implemented through a simple change in regulation. According to Minister Wilson, this legislation will likely not take effect until June.
In short, tenants, who were led to believe they would get prompt relief from rising rents, will have to wait while the government sorts out how to enact this promise. The lack of planning on the part of the province prior to Tuesday’s announcement demonstrates, once again, that the Higgs’ government is not committed to ending the housing crisis in New Brunswick.
Tenants are angry, upset, and confused. For a brief moment, it appeared as though tenants could predict their rental costs for the year and make financial plans. This is no longer the case. The Coalition, along with other community organizations, is working hard to understand how the cap will be implemented and what will be required of tenants who need to have this cap applied retroactively.
“The Government of New Brunswick spent years doing nothing about this crisis and claimed that rent control would not work. Now that they have realized rent control is needed, they have botched it by first promising a temporary rent cap that would do little to abate the crisis, and then failing to enact it with urgency,” said Jael Duarte, the Tenants Advocate for the NB Coalition for Tenants Rights.
Instead of advancing half-baked non-solutions, the Government of New Brunswick must act swiftly to enact robust and permanent rent control with oversight from a strengthened Residential Tenancies Tribunal. “We need a Residential Tenancies Act that puts human rights at its centre, and that means a right to housing approach to tenancies in this province,” Duarte said.