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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2025-11-12 Daily Xml
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Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill

Introduction and First Reading

The Hon. A. MICHAELS (Enfield—Minister for Small and Family Business, Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs, Minister for Arts) (15:49): Obtained leave and introduced a bill for an act to amend the Residential Tenancies Act 1995. Read a first time.

Second Reading

The Hon. A. MICHAELS (Enfield—Minister for Small and Family Business, Minister for Consumer and Business Affairs, Minister for Arts) (15:50): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speech and explanation of clauses inserted in Hansard without my reading them.

Leave granted.

Mr Speaker, I am pleased to introduce the Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Bill 2025 (the Bill).

The Bill proposes to make minor technical amendments to the Residential Tenancies Act 1995 (the Act), based on stakeholder feedback received on the 2023/2024 large scale reforms made to the Act.

The largest reforms made to the Act in nearly 30 years were fully implemented from 1 July 2024. Since that date, Consumer and Business Services (CBS) has received feedback on several of the amendments to the Act, and how they are affecting industry stakeholders.

Earlier this year, the expiration of the Residential Tenancies Regulations (Regulations) provided an opportunity to consult with industry stakeholders on proposed amendments to the Regulations, as well as proposed minor amendments to the Act. Consultation occurred with organisations including the Real Estate Institute of South Australia, the Law Society of South Australia, RentRight SA, the Landlords' Association of South Australia and the South Australian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (SACAT).

The outcome of this consultation informed the drafting of the Bill, which I am pleased to introduce today.

The amendments proposed in the Bill further the Government's commitment to improve housing outcomes for people in South Australia. The Bill will ensure that the rights of renters continue to be improved, and ensures that landlords and rooming house proprietors can continue to manage properties effectively.

When National Cabinet met on 16 August 2023, it was agreed to move towards a national standard of no more than one rent increase per year for a tenant in the same property across fixed and ongoing tenancy agreements. To implement this, the previous reforms amended section 55 of the Act. This was aimed at preventing rent increases occurring before 12 months had passed after the rental agreement commenced, or, if there had been a previous increase of rent, 12 months since the last increase.

However, a further amendment to the Act is now required to close a pre-existing loophole that currently allows for more frequent rent increases, in the event that an agreement includes a term listing automatic rent increases at stated intervals. Such terms may be hidden near the end of a rental agreement, which may not have been contemplated by tenants, who are blindsided when their rent suddenly increases during the term of their lease. Therefore, a key amendment in this Bill will prevent those agreement terms that allow for increases to a tenant's rent occurring more than once in a 12-month period. It will also prohibit rent increases occurring more than once in a 6-month period for rooming house residents.

An addition of the definition of 'receipt' to the interpretation section of the Act will help to clarify that receipts provided to tenants may be in either electronic or hard copy format. This modernises the concept of issuing receipts to tenants, provided the required information is included in an electronic receipt.

Section 91A(1) was added as part of the previous reforms made to the Act, which requires landlords of fixed-term tenancies to wait six months to re-let their rental premises after terminating a tenancy on certain grounds. The rationale behind inserting section 91A(1) to the Act, was to prevent the misuse of termination grounds and protect tenant security.

However, a pre-existing section of the Act relating to periodic residential tenancies is inconsistent with that approach. This is because landlords of periodic tenancies must wait 6 months after taking possession of the rental premises to grant a fresh tenancy, when the tenancy has been terminated on certain grounds. The 6 months' timeframe commencing from possession of the rental premises for periodic tenancies, rather than from the date that a termination notice is served on a tenant, becomes effectively 2 months longer for landlords waiting to re-let their rental property than those with fixed-term tenancies (taking into account the 60 days' notice required for termination). The proposed amendment to section 81(4) of the Act simply ensures consistent language and timeframes apply to landlords re-letting a property, after terminating both fixed-term and periodic tenancies in those circumstances.

The inclusion of section 100(5a) clarifies that section 6 of the Unclaimed Money Act 2021 (UMA) applies to the Commissioner for Consumer Affairs (the Commissioner) in relation to unclaimed bond monies held in the Residential Tenancies Fund.

The amount of money held in the Residential Tenancies Fund can, from time to time depending on how long it has been held, represent a liability to the Commissioner. The proposed amendment will make clear that the Commissioner is able to pay unclaimed monies to the Treasurer where that money has been held for at least 12 months, and the owner of the money cannot be found.

The reasons currently available to landlords when terminating periodic rooming house agreements, are not available in the case of fixed-term roominghouse agreements. This means that rooming house proprietors are limited to terminating a fixed-term rooming house agreement on the ground that a rooming house resident has breached their agreement. The inclusion of requiring grounds for termination of periodic rooming house agreements occurred in the previous reforms made to the Act. It now makes sense to apply identical grounds for termination to fixed-term rooming house agreements, such as a proprietor wishing to move in, renovate, demolish or sell the rooming house.

The Bill also proposes to amend the definition of 'relevant decision' contained in section 114A of the Act. This would explicitly exclude SACAT vacant possession orders, that contain rent payment plans, from being captured by the definition of 'relevant decision'. At present, if a vacant possession order contains an element of rent payments to be made by a tenant (either in arrears or in the future before the lease is terminated), a tenant must prove that exceptional circumstances apply in order to be granted leave by the Tribunal to apply for an internal review. In order to determine whether exceptional circumstances exist, SACAT must go through a full hearing, which has led to inefficiencies for SACAT including increased hearing times regarding time-sensitive vacant possession matters. This amendment was suggested by SACAT during the consultation process.

The Bill therefore implements the feedback received on previous large-scale reforms to the Act, ensuring a fair rental system for all.

I commend this Bill to the House.

Explanation of Clauses

Part 1—Preliminary

1—Short title

2—Commencement

These clauses are formal.

Part 2—Amendment of Residential Tenancies Act 1995

3—Amendment of section 3—Interpretation

This section is amended to allow receipts to be in paper or electronic form.

4—Amendment of section 55—Variation of rent

Subsection (6), which currently disapplies section 55 from a provision of a residential tenancy agreement under which the rent payable under the agreement changes automatically at stated intervals on a basis set out in the agreement, is deleted.

5—Amendment of section 81—Termination because possession is required by landlord for certain purposes

Section 81(4) is amended to adopt language consistent with section 91A(1).

6—Amendment of section 100—Residential Tenancies Fund

The Commissioner is authorised to pay unclaimed money to the Treasurer in accordance with section 6 of the Unclaimed Money Act 2021.

7—Amendment of section 105I—Rent increases

The equivalent amendment to the amendment to section 55 is made in relation to rooming house agreements.

8—Amendment of section 105U—Termination of rooming house agreement

The phrase 'providing for accommodation on a periodic basis' is deleted so that section 105U(6) applies to fixed term agreements as well as periodic ones.

9—Amendment of section 114A—Internal review in relation to certain orders

Certain orders are excluded from the definition of relevant decision.

10—Insertion of Schedule 4

Schedule 4 is inserted:

Schedule 4—Transitional provisions—Residential Tenancies (Miscellaneous) Amendment Act 2025

Transitional provisions are inserted for the purposes of the measure.

Debate adjourned on motion of Mr Teague.

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