Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister of Justice. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister explain what mechanisms are in place to address repair and maintenance of tenant units? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Member from Great Slave. Minister of Justice.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So in terms of the government's role in the repair and maintenance of privatelyowned residential units, we have the Residential Tenancies Act and, of course, this is administered by the NWT rental officer. The act requires landlords to maintain premises in a state of repair a good state of repair and fit for habitation, and they must comply with all the applicable health and safety legislation that we have in the territory. The rental officer, if a constituent or sorry, if a resident is having an issue with their unit and they believe it is not being maintained to those standards, they can make an application to the rental officer. The rental officer can provide an order that would authorize the tenant to remedy the situation, essentially do the repairs, and then get that money back from the landlord. The act can there can be orders requiring a landlord to compensate the tenant if there are damages to the tenant's goods because of the state of repair of the unit. And the landlord is required to remedy the breach pursuant to the order within ten days of receiving that order, and there are fines if the landlord does not comply with that. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that. And, yes, I do realize that the NWT rental office has that capacity but they also, in their annual report, state that the office receives many inquiries from tenants regarding landlord obligations to repair but have little follow through. So my question is can the Minister review the tenant complaint process under the rental office to remove any challenges that tenants face to address landlord obligations to repair? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So the Residential Tenancies Act will be reviewed during this government so all of those issues can be looked at. The access to the rental officer, any barriers that tenants might be facing; we can look at all of that. I cannot commit to remove any barrier that a tenant might be facing, but we do want to make the process as easy and simple as possible so that we can achieve the goals of the act. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, from previous discussions held in this House, which included tabled photographs of infestations of tenant units, there are sometimes ongoing environmental health concerns in residential units. So can the Minister please explain how the NWT rental office works with other government departments to monitor the environmental health and safety of units? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So the rental office enforces the Residential Tenancies Act, and that is applicable when there is an agreement between a tenant and the landlord. So while there are other government entities that may monitor environmental health, such as the environment health unit in the department of health of the fire marshal with MACA, those entities are not part of that contract between a landlord and a tenant. So there is an onus on the tenants who actually do that work and bring forward those concerns to the rental officer. The government isn't going to go and inspect people's units and bring forward issues to the rental officer on behalf of tenants. Thank you.
Oral questions. Final supplementary. Great Slave.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Based on his previous answer, I don't think the Minister will commit to what I'm asking but I will ask all the same. Could the Minister commit to provide an interdepartmental response to address tenant concerns with respect to environmental health in tenant units? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. So during this Assembly, I look forward to seeing how we can address some of the issues that we face with housing at large in the territory. I know when we talk about housing, it's often subsidized housing but there's issues with market housing as well. And so with that focus and with the review of the Residential Tenancies Act, I think we can make some progress in this area. But as I stated before, it's up to the individual to bring forward their complaints. It would be ideal if we had the people and the budget to go around and do these inspections and have a very collaborative crossdepartmental approach to ensuring peoples' living conditions are safe, but there is an onus on the individual to bring forward their concerns. And if they're facing issues accessing the rental officer, I encourage them to contact the rental officer and have discussions because they're not just there to enforce orders and issue orders. They are there to provide information as well. Alternatively, I encourage tenants to consult with their MLAs. Thank you.
Oral questions. Member from Yellowknife Centre.
