Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 12 November 2025.)

Mr TEAGUE (Heysen—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (16:21): I rise to address the bill. I indicate I am the lead speaker for the opposition and, at the outset, I indicate the opposition's support for the bill. The bill really needs to be read alongside the 2023 bill, which provided for a whole range of new arrangements in relation to residential tenancies. That bill we opposed, and the reasons for that are on the face of the record.

The bulk of the provisions of this bill are either uncontroversial correction improvements or they are rendering the circumstances more fully consistent with the 2023 bill. I note that the 2023 bill left, it has been found, the provision in a couple of respects for—notwithstanding a newly introduced regime in which no more than one increase in rent might be applied in any 12-month period—the capacity for a contract to be entered into, nonetheless, that provided for automatic rental increases on its own terms at a rate greater than annually. That is one of the substantive changes that is the subject of the bill.

I just highlight that what might be said about that is that the government bringing that on now will, I am sure, also characterise it as something that it would have intended to do on the first time around. So I am not going to say more than that, but those who are following closely will be reminded that there is a substantially new and different set of arrangements that are in place in relation to residential tenancies, chiefly the result of what was done a couple of years ago.

The minister has incorporated with leave the government speech into Hansard yesterday afternoon. That is a very thorough contribution to the debate. I am not going to rehearse it here, but I will draw attention to the Hansard, commencing at page 14090 at 10 minutes to 4pm yesterday and the pages thereafter, which contain both the second reading speech and the explanation of clauses.

I take the opportunity to note as well that we are here close to the end of the sitting calendar for this year and, indeed, for this parliament. So while I would ordinarily be inclined to be a little bit critical of the pace that this has come on, in the circumstances, this will allow for the bill to make it to another place in time for the final sitting week, which I understand will facilitate its passage should it gain necessary support there before the parliament wraps up for the year. So there is some method in that regard, and I do not protest too much about the pace in those circumstances.

I also appreciate the sensible way in which the minister's advisers and the department have made themselves available and, indeed, have made some extra efforts to ensure that the provision of information has been made available. That is noted and appreciated.

It is not a matter of a bill that is making only technical changes. Undoubtedly the bill contains further changes of substance, but they are characterised in the way that I have described them. It is in those circumstances that the opposition supports the bill, rendering perhaps a more complete and coherent treatment of the subject matter that is primarily the subject of the 2023 bill. There will be an opportunity to consider it in the time between the houses as well, but for the time being, I commend the bill to the house.

Ms HUTCHESSON (Waite) (16:27): I rise today in support of the Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025, which continues this government's commitment to ensuring South Australia's rental laws are fair, modern and balanced, protecting tenants' rights while giving landlords the clarity and confidence they need to manage their properties effectively. This bill builds on the most comprehensive review of South Australia's rental laws in nearly three decades. Over the course of 2023 and 2024, the state government conducted the largest review of the Residential Tenancies Act 1995, the first major review in almost 30 years.

The aim of that review was clear: to modernise the Residential Tenancies Act and strike the right balance between protecting the interests of both tenants and landlords. Following that review, the government implemented major reforms on 1 July 2024, delivering fairer rules around ending tenancies, improving minimum housing standards, strengthening protections for tenants experiencing domestic abuse, and clarifying responsibilities for landlords and tenants alike.

Since those reforms came into effect, the government has listened carefully to feedback from tenants, landlords, agents and the South Australian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (SACAT). The amendments before us today are largely technical in nature. They fine-tune the system to ensure the law operates as intended. This bill contains a series of amendments that will make the rental framework more consistent and fair for all parties.

The intent of last year's reforms was to limit rent increases to once in any 12-month period; however, current subsections inadvertently allow for more frequent rent increases for standard residential tenancies where rent could be raised more than once in 12 months. This bill removes the inconsistencies, ensuring rent cannot be increased more than once in a 12-month period, bringing fairness and predictability to tenants and landlords alike.

The bill also introduces a definition of 'receipt' into the Residential Tenancies Act to make it clear that receipts for rent or bond payments can be provided electronically or in hard copy. This better reflects the way people transact today. The bill also provides consistent timeframes in the act applying to both periodic and fixed-term leases. This means landlords who terminate a lease on certain prescribed grounds will face the same restrictions on reletting regardless of the lease type. This ensures that protections for tenants are applied evenly and that landlords operate under clear, consistent rules.

The bill clarifies that section 6 of the Unclaimed Money Act 2021 applies to the Commissioner for Consumer and Business Services. This ensures that any unclaimed bond moneys held in the Residential Tenancies Fund can be properly paid to the Treasurer, improving the administration and accountability of public funds. The bill also makes it clear that the prescribed grounds for the termination of rooming house agreements as set out in the Residential Tenancies Regulations 2025 apply equally to both fixed-term and periodic agreements. This closes a gap in the law and guarantees that rooming house residents, who are often among our most vulnerable, receive fair and consistent treatment under the act.

The bill amends the definition of 'relevant decision' for the purpose of internal reviews of SACAT decisions. Currently, leave for review cannot be granted unless exceptional circumstances exist, but SACAT has identified that certain time-sensitive matters, such as vacant possession orders containing rental payment plans, have been unintentionally caught by this rule. This bill will exclude those orders from the definition, reducing delays and improving efficiency in the tribunal's processes—a practical, commonsense fix that ensures SACAT can focus its time where it is needed the most.

While these amendments are primarily technical, they sit within a much larger context of the government's continued effort to strengthen fairness and stability in South Australia's rental sector. The 2024 reforms modernised the Residential Tenancies Act 1995, the Residential Parks Act 2007 and the Real Property Act 1886. Those reforms introduced prescribed grounds for ending tenancies, minimum housing standards, greater protection for tenants experiencing domestic abuse, fairer rules for pet ownership and improved safeguards for privacy and data protection. They also created a more consistent and transparent framework for rent increases, inspection limits and energy efficiency standards. Together, these reforms brought our rental laws in line with contemporary expectations to be fair, balanced and humane. Today's bill refines those changes, ensuring the law operates smoothly and fairly in practice.

In my own electorate, I have heard from both tenants and landlords about the importance of stability and clarity in rental agreements. Tenants want confidence that they cannot lose their homes without fair reason and landlords want reassurance that they can manage their investments effectively under clear, workable rules. This bill delivers exactly that balance: fair protections for tenants and fair processes for landlords. It makes the system simpler, more consistent and more equitable for everyone involved.

The Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025 is a sensible and balanced piece of legislation that strengthens the administration of South Australia's rental framework. It builds on the major reforms of 2024 and continues this government's ongoing commitment to fair, modern and transparent housing laws. This bill will help ensure that all South Australians, whether they rent or provide rental housing, can do so with confidence, clarity and fairness. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms THOMPSON (Davenport) (16:33): I rise to speak to the Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025. Before the last election, the Malinauskas Labor team laid out a plan for A Better Housing Future: a plan overwhelmingly endorsed by the people of South Australia. Central to that vision was our commitment to improve outcomes for renters and prospective renters in our state, and, as we have done across the board, we have moved swiftly and decisively to deliver on those promises.

Since coming to government, we have banned rent bidding; aligned bond thresholds with modern rental prices, saving tenants millions; and outlawed unfair, no-cause evictions. We have strengthened protections for tenants with pets, ensuring that wanting a roof over your head does not mean saying goodbye to a beloved family member. Each of these reforms has provided real relief and real fairness for renters at a time when South Australia continues to face record rental demand.

The bill before us today continues that work, modernising, simplifying and clarifying the law to make it fairer, more consistent and easy to navigate for tenants and landlords alike. This bill might not make the front page, but it is another important step in delivering a fair, modern and balanced rental system.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I bring members' attention to the speaker on the floor, so it would be good if we could actually listen to the speaker. Not me, I mean the person speaking.

Ms THOMPSON: It makes a series of practical amendments to the Residential Tenancies Act 1995, including:

allowing receipts to be provided in either paper or electronic form, a simple but meaningful change that reflects how people transact today;

removing outdated provisions around automatic rent increases, bringing it more in line with section 55, which is aimed at limiting rent increases to once in a 12-month period, which also aligns with the national cabinet's A Better Deal for Renters recommendation that called for jurisdictions to move towards a national standard of no more than one rent increase per year;

aligning language across the act so that sections dealing with possession and termination are clearer and more consistent;

clarifying how unclaimed money is handled by allowing the commissioner to transfer unclaimed funds to the Treasurer under the Unclaimed Money Act 2021;

extending key tenant protections in rooming houses so that they apply not only to periodic agreements but also to fixed-term agreements; and

streamlining internal review processes to ensure decisions are dealt with fairly and efficiently.

Together, these updates strengthen the foundations of our rental laws, closing gaps, removing ambiguity and improving fairness and accessibility across our system. These are the kinds of practical improvements that make a difference. They are small steps that, when added together, make renting fairer, safer and easier to manage.

Our government remains deeply committed to ensuring every South Australian has access to a safe, secure and affordable home. Alongside this bill, we continue to deliver the largest public housing investment in a generation, expand access to the new independent tenancy advocacy service and open the door to new housing opportunities, including exploring the use of additional dwellings, like granny flats, to ease pressure on the market. Each of these initiatives, big or small, forms part of a clear, consistent plan to make housing more affordable, fairer and accessible for all South Australians.

I again thank the renters, landlords and community organisations who have worked with us over the past two years to help shape a fairer rental system. This bill reflects our ongoing commitment to getting the details right, to ensuring the law keeps pace with modern realities and that fairness is at the heart of every change we make. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms CLANCY (Elder) (16:37): I rise today in support of the Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025. While the amendments before us today are largely technical, they are an important continuation of the significant reform the Malinauskas Labor government has already undertaken on the Residential Tenancies Act.

When we came to government in 2022, South Australia's rental laws had not kept pace with the realities facing renters or the pressures of the housing market more broadly. In my electorate of Elder in the southern suburbs, almost a third of households are renters, and they had seen their rents increase significantly, including in some cases increases in excess of 60 per cent over the past five years. Renters were living with enormous insecurity. They were fearful of raising concerns about repairs and maintenance, worried about bonds and hidden costs, and deeply anxious that at any moment their tenancy could end for no reason at all.

That is why our reform of the Residential Tenancies Act was so essential to South Australian renters. It finally brought fairness, transparency and protections to a system that had tipped out of balance. One of the most important aspects of our reforms was the ending of no-cause evictions in South Australia, something renters had been calling for over many years.

The law now requires landlords to provide a prescribed reason when ending a periodic tenancy or choosing not to renew a fixed-term lease. The change ensures that renters cannot be removed from their home simply because they asked for a repair or some maintenance or they raised a concern or were just considered inconvenient for their landlord.

We also extended the notice period for termination from 28 days to 60 days, giving South Australians more time to find a new home, organise removals and make arrangements for their families. This change was particularly important in a tight rental market where vacancies are at record lows.

One of our changes that I am most proud of, which I know the member for Davenport is a big fan of as well as a big animal lover—she is not here anymore—is our amendment to allow tenants to keep pets, with reasonable conditions. Pets provide companionship, reduce loneliness and support mental wellbeing. I love coming home from work, and no matter how late in the day that might be, my dog Pepsi will greet me so enthusiastically you would think I had been gone for years, not hours. Renters also deserve the unconditional love, or casual indifference if they have a cat, that comes with having a pet in their home.

Since the full implementation of these reforms last year, we have listened closely to the feedback of tenants, landlords, community organisations, and the South Australian Civil and Administrative Tribunal. What we have heard is that while these reforms have been successful, making a tangible impact on supporting renters in our state, several technical adjustments are necessary to ensure the act operates as intended.

The bill before us today delivers those adjustments. This bill seeks to close an unintended loophole that allowed rents to be increased more than once in a 12-month period for tenants and more than once in a six-month period for rooming house residents. Our intention has always been clear: to give renters certainty, stability and predictability when it comes to the cost of keeping a roof over their heads.

This bill restores that intention by ensuring rent increases occur only with the limits originally intended. Further amendments included in this bill improve clarity and consistency by defining 'receipt' to allow both electronic and hard copy receipts to be recognised under the act and standardise timeframes that restrict landlords from reletting a property after terminating a tenancy on certain prescribed grounds. These timeframes will now be consistent across both periodic and fixed-term leases to ensure fairness and prevent the misuse of termination grounds.

This bill before us today may not grab any headlines but it will make an enormous impact on the renters in my community and across our state more broadly. Our targeted and deliberate reform of the Residential Tenancies Act has already made a substantial impact on renters and will continue to make the system fairer, clearer and more consistent.

Landlords who already manage their properties responsibly have welcomed these reforms for bringing clarity and consistency to the system, acknowledging our reform targets poor conduct and power imbalances rather than punishing good landlords for doing the right thing. In closing, I would like to again thank our Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs and everyone in her team for their ongoing commitment to reforming and refining a rental market in the best interests of more South Australians.

To the renters in my community, we hear you. While our reforms have collectively saved renters more than $11 million in just over 12 months, renting in our state is still expensive, and many families and individuals do continue to struggle to keep up with the cost of living. We still have more work to do, including initiatives discussed in this place just this week, such as supporting the commonwealth's Help to Buy scheme in South Australia. We remain absolutely committed to making renting in South Australia fairer, safer and more secure. I commend this bill to the house.

Mr HUGHES (Giles) (16:44): I also rise to support the Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025. I think it has already been pointed out that even though some very reasonable changes are incorporated in this bill, the substantial body of work was in the bill that was introduced into the parliament back in 2023. This is a tidying up of some of the elements through that first amendment bill, which at the time was the first substantial body of work that had been done on the Residential Tenancies Act for many years, and indeed as part of that whole process there was extensive consultation.

I think it is always good to see—and I have said this already today in relation to another bill—our legislation, our bills and then subsequently our acts, are often subject to an iterative process and as time goes on there are additional amendments that might well be needed, and so that act of review is a good direction to go in.

I was looking back at what I said on the 2023 bill and I noticed I spoke for a long time on that particular bill, both on the bill and some of the wider issues when it comes to housing. Some of the other members, because I am the last one to speak, have already gone through some of the technical changes in this bill, and I am always loath to repeat what has already been said by others. I am a great believer in efficiency, so I am not going to repeat what some of the other members have said, even though I have these nice comprehensive notes that I could read verbatim. But given they are already now in Hansard in a draft fashion from others, I do not intend to do that.

The original amendments in 2023 and now this bill are one of those attempts to try to find the right balance when it comes to landlords, if that is still the term we use for people who own houses they rent out, and tenants.

When you look at a lot of the social literature about what underpins, in general, a good life, there are three elements. One of those elements is shelter. Another one is purpose, whether that is through work or things you do in the community by having a sense of purpose. The other element is relationships, positive relationships. If you have those three factors in place, you have got a far greater chance of having a more fruitful existence.

But shelter is incredibly important. We know that in Australia at the moment there is what can be fairly called a housing crisis and in this state we are taking a layered approach to that housing crisis. This bill and the subsequent changes to the Residential Tenancies Act is one of those layers addressing some of the needs of tenants. When you look at Australia in general when it comes to tenancies, the sorts of protections that exist in other advanced countries in Europe and elsewhere are, to a large degree, absent in Australia.

It is quite commonplace in overseas countries for people to have long, secure tenancies. There is a far greater degree of instability in Australia when it comes to tenancies. Tenancy rights in Europe and elsewhere are treated in a different way. I believe there are things that we can learn from Europe—and we have to learn, because there has been a fundamental shift in Australia. Once upon a time the assumption was—and it was an accurate assumption—that most people would eventually own their own house. The fact that home ownership was at such a high percentage in Australia influenced to a degree the nature of our social safety net.

So, given that assumption about housing, it no longer stands, and it no longer stands especially for a range of people in our population. For young people there have been some recent surveys and very high percentages indicate that they believe they will never own a house. Then when you add to that the way that rents have gone up in recent years, it is deeply concerning.

There are other vulnerable elements of our population who are also at risk. One of the biggest growing groups is women who were in relationships but who separated. I do not count 50-plus as old, but for 50-plus there is very insecure housing. There are tragic stories of people having to live in—if you can call it live in—or having to survive in a car or another vehicle.

The issues that we face with the way house prices have escalated, you can track back to the year 2000. That is when the gap started between income and housing. There is a whole range of reasons for that. I have my own particular views about what has happened, strangely enough. Once upon a time people saw housing as a home and as is the wont now—you might want to call it the neoliberal approach—it is the financialisation of everything, and we saw the financialisation of housing. Housing became, for more and more people, an investment.

That introduced some fundamental changes, and that combination of negative gearing and concessional capital gains tax did, contrary to some opposing views, have a profound impact on the housing market. Out of curiosity I have been to a few auctions in Adelaide. House prices are still relatively cheap in Whyalla, so if you want to move to Whyalla and get a job, you will do far better. Going to some of those auctions in Adelaide there were people who already own houses, and sometimes multiple properties, and they are often significantly advantaged in comparison to first-home owners. To say that does not have an impact I think is nonsense.

One of the things that we are trying to do in this state is open up supply, open up landholdings, and a willingness to invest in infrastructure, basic infrastructure, especially water, and that does come at a cost. That does come at a cost and sometimes the whole community bears that cost. Opening up land and addressing some of the planning regulations in order to increase supply is clearly one direction that we can go in as a state. We do not have control over some of the stuff that is happening at the federal level.

I come from a community where, at one time, over 60 per cent of the housing in Whyalla was Housing Trust property. That was part of industry policy. I came out with my family from the UK and within a few weeks of being here we had a Housing Trust house in Whyalla, and both my parents trundled off to work at the steelworks. That was part of industry policy.

When I first started working at the steelworks, I got a Housing Trust house. That meant that I could save up because the rent was capped as a percentage of your wage. I was on a full wage so 25 per cent of that was my rent, and that was fair enough, but it gave you an opportunity to then save and go into the private housing market and buy your first house. I would argue that we need to re-look at that; we need to re-look at some of that policy back then, especially in communities like mine where there is such an overwhelming percentage still of public housing. The idea that all of this housing over a period is going to be category 1 housing—you just end up concentrating social disadvantage, which is not to the advantage of the people living in those areas and it is not to the advantage of the wider community.

I could say a lot more about this. I could go through all the layers of our housing policy, but I will not. I commend this bill to the house. It is a good piece of work, built on that piece of work from 2023. I do commend the bill to the house.

The Hon. A. MICHAELS (Enfield—Minister for Small and Family Business, Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs, Minister for Arts) (16:55): I am pleased to commend this bill to the house. As speakers who have made contributions to this bill have pointed out, this is obviously part of the larger residential tenancies reforms that we have made. There are a few technical amendments that inevitably you will find once such large reform has been in operation. We did a 12-month review and have made a few technical amendments in this bill.

I thank the member for Heysen for promptly paying attention to this bill in the last 24 hours. I appreciate his work to get us to this point and the opposition's support for this bill. With that, I commend the bill to the House.

Bill read a second time.

Third Reading

The Hon. A. MICHAELS (Enfield—Minister for Small and Family Business, Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs, Minister for Arts) (16:56): I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

Bill read a third time and passed.