Bills

Residential Tenancies (Minimum Standards) Amendment Bill

Committee Stage

In committee.

Clause 1.

The Hon. R.A. SIMMS: I thought it might be helpful, in the interest of time, for me to clarify for members where we are at with this. This bill has been referred to a select committee. The select committee has handed down its report; it was tabled last session. Hopefully those members with an interest have had an opportunity to look at it.

From my perspective, the committee report is a bit paradoxical because the findings do not match the recommendation. The recommendation is that the bill will not proceed, yet the committee received overwhelming submissions and feedback that this was a positive innovation. Indeed, we did not receive any adverse submissions in relation to the bill, and that was a matter that was noted in the report itself.

The Landlords' Association did not make a submission advocating against the reform. Indeed, there was no submission against this bill, and I think that is because it was a pretty straightforward proposition. It is offering some pretty modest changes. There were, however, some drafting errors in the bill that were identified by CBS, and that is what my amendments reflect.

So I will test for consensus on the first one of those amendments and see if there is any support for that. If there is not, then I will not proceed with the rest of the amendments. I wanted to file amendments to give members the maximum opportunity to be able to support the bill. I did not want it to get into committee stage and for members to raise, 'Well, why haven't you taken up feedback on the drafting errors?', so that is what my amendments have done.

I think it is also worth highlighting the number of proponents that support the bill. Indeed, there was a piece in InDaily the other day that went through some of the supporters of this bill. They include Better Renting, Anti-Poverty Network, Australian Sustainable Built Environment Council, SACOSS and SA Power Networks. They are just some of the stakeholder groups that support this bill.

What the bill is asking for are some pretty basic standards: minimum energy efficiency standards for rentals, mandating things like fly screens on windows, mandating things like ensuring that air conditioning systems work and operate effectively. It puts in some water efficiency requirements as well, and it ensures that energy efficiency is made transparent to a prospective tenant before they enter into a lease.

A lot of these things are already law in other jurisdictions. Indeed, part of the feedback that came through in the committee was that my bill was actually too modest and did not go far enough. Despite that, the Labor and Liberal members of the committee could not bring themselves to support this as a modest advance in the rights of renters. I think South Australian renters are sick and tired of being treated as second-class citizens.

There are thousands and thousands of South Australians who rent and they deserve to live in homes that are cool in summer and warm in winter and have their basic amenities provided for. I am disappointed with how things unfolded on the committee. I do not think the outcome reflects the evidence that was presented to the committee. Rather, it reflects the predetermined views of the two major political parties; that is a disappointing outcome. It is my plan, if this bill is not successful tonight, to move to reintroduce it into the new parliament. I think this will be a key issue for the next state election because many, many South Australians want to see a fair go for renters in our state. I am going to continue to push for that.

The Hon. I.K. HUNTER: Very briefly, I would like to thank the Hon. Mr Simms for refreshing our memories at this late hour on the process that led us to where we are. The bill that the Hon. Mr Simms seeks to prosecute has gone to a select committee where their recommendations, as I understand it, is that the bill not be proceeded with. If the Hon. Mr Simms could not convince the members of that select committee that the bill should be supported, I do not think he is going to do so this evening in this chamber.

I indicate that rather than gut every clause of the bill here in committee, I will oppose his first amendment, and I am grateful that he said he will not then prosecute the rest, and we will be opposing the third reading.

The Hon. J.M.A. LENSINK: I will use this opportunity to place some comments on the record in relation to the committee process and the findings. I think it is fair to say that somewhere between the Hon. Mr Simms and myself there is some sort of cognitive dissonance going on because I had thought that it would be a useful exercise for this particular bill to be referred to a committee because I was hoping that, rather than rehash the debates on the bill on its merits as it is, there might be some additional information that would come to light.

Unfortunately that was not to be the case. We only heard from one side of the debate and it was certainly my view, and I am assuming the view of the government, that there is another side of the debate. They did not make submissions to this committee which is disappointing. That is in spite of earnest attempts to get them to make submissions.

The terminology that we use in the parliament where we talk about 'evidence', parliamentary evidence is not the same as what is understood in the general vernacular, which is things that can be stated, a statement of fact that has been tested. Evidence, in the parliamentary sense, is often people's opinions.

One of the things that I have been at pains to get to the bottom of is some of the issues that people raise about housing standards which are, in fact, already covered under existing legislation. When people come to us and say, 'We've got this landlord who won't fix certain things that are essential to the property,' and there are things like entrance ways that do not have adequate doors or flyscreens: these are actually things which are required under legislation—the Housing Improvement Act, for instance. I will just take issue with the Hon. Simms because it is a bit of a modus operandi of the Greens to raise these issues that are often not necessarily practical measures and then beat up major parties for not caring, which is just nonsense, frankly.

I am very much someone who likes evidence and, based on the evidence, these constant issues which get raised which are already covered under legislation are a source of great frustration and people are being misled. I am hoping that the Greens do not seek to weaponise misinformation which is something that gets thrown around. That would be very disappointing indeed.

The Hon. Mr Simms talks about flyscreens on windows: these are required under legislation. Water efficiency measures, over time, as houses are changed, are subject to the WELS scheme. He has said that renters are being treated like second-class citizens. I refer to the submission that we did get from the Consumer and Business Services which is really quite compelling and I think it would be cavalier of this parliament to ignore the advice of CBS. I am not going to quote the whole thing; it is available on the committee website. CBS wrote to the committee—I think it was quite activated by the proposals in the bill—and it said:

These tenancy reforms included measures to provide tenants with adequate recourse to ensure that rental properties meet the minimum housing standards under the Housing Improvement Act 2016 and the Housing Improvement Regulations…

Reforms to the Act and the Regulations also included requirements that all new appliances and fixtures installed in rental properties meet minimum efficiency standards.

Then it says, further down:

Further, I am concerned that the Bill proposes to raise the minimum standards required in rental homes to exceed the HIA Minimum Standards.

The HIA is the Housing Improvement Act. It goes on:

The Bill would therefore create a higher threshold of minimum housing standards applying to rental premises, over and above the standards required of all other categories of residential premises in the State.

What the CBS is saying is that rather than being second-class citizens people who are renting will actually have to have a higher standard, and I think there are some practical issues in that. It goes on to say:

The HIA Minimum Standards are the standards that must be met for residential premises to be considered safe and suitable for human habitation in South Australia. These standards include being reasonably draught and weatherproof, being reasonably free from the adverse effects of moisture or damp, having adequate kitchen, bathroom and laundry facilities, and having secure external doors with locks.

This is in the act already. It continues:

The HIA Minimum Standards are less onerous than the minimum standards proposed in the Bill, as they do not require houses to have specific heating, air conditioning or roof insulation requirements.

In practical terms, it talks about that, but in effect it would be a two-tiered system. Take the example of someone who is an owner-occupier for instance, who gets a job interstate and decides that rather than sell their house they might rent it out. This means that they would need to consider a whole new regime, that would now apply to renters, that they would have to refit their house with. I think some people who were landlords in this state have reached the conclusion that renting already is all too hard, and this is just going to make it even worse.

Rather than the Greens trying to demonise people who do not agree with this particular bill, I think in a practical sense we just need to understand what the rules are at the moment and what this bill is seeking to do. It is rather naively assuming that all tenants are being placed in substandard housing, which clearly breaches existing laws.

If people who potentially are landlords decide that it is all too hard, that means there are fewer houses and the prices go up, so it is actually not benefiting things to do things in such a manner. I think it is quite disingenuous and disappointing for the honourable member to try to characterise other people who sat on the committee in good faith in any other manner than that we were seeking to genuinely find issues but still find this bill wanting. We did not support it in the past. It should be no surprise that we are not going to support it.

Clause passed.

Clause 2.

The Hon. R.A. SIMMS: I move:

Amendment No 1 [Simms–1]—

Page 2, line 10 [clause 2, inserted paragraph (ea)]—Delete (ea) and substitute '(eaa)'

As I indicated earlier, my amendments are following up some of the drafting issues that were identified in the bill. I will move the first amendment and see how that goes, and we will take it from there.

Amendment negatived; clause passed.

Remaining clauses (3 and 4) and title passed.

Bill reported without amendment.

Third Reading

The Hon. R.A. SIMMS (23:30): I move:

That this bill be now read a third time.

The council divided on the third reading:

Ayes 2

Noes 16

Majority 14

AYES

NOES

Third reading thus negatived.