Petition asks province to allow tenants in abusive situations to break leases

An advocate for the rights of tenants and landlords has launcheda petition to make it easier for people in abusive relationships to break the lease fortheir rental properties.

Sherwin Flight is moderator of the Newfoundland Tenant and Landlord Support Group on Facebook, which hasmore than 6,000 members. Itmostly servesas a place for people to ask questions and share information about renting a property as either a tenant or a landlord.

Following other provinces

Flight said hestarted the change.org petitionthis week becausethere are only a few exemptions to the province's Residential Tenancies Act that allow tenants in certain situations to terminate a fixed-term rental agreement early,and they mostly deal with health and medical issues.

"Currently there is no legislation in the province that would allow victims of domestic abuse or sexual assault to terminate a rental agreement early," Flight told CBC Radio'sCentral Morning Show.

"There are some other provinces that do have legislation like that but we don't have anything like that here."

Flight said it's important that legislation exists so that people can move from dangerous situationswithout legal consequences. Otherwise, they could face more abuse if forced to remain in theproperty.

Even when the abused person and the abuser don't live together, it could be important for the victimto break a lease so they canleave without the abuser knowingwhere they've moved.

The rights of landlords

Flight recognizes that the rights of landlords must also be protected, and that rules must be put in place so people can't get out of a lease without a valid reason.

"Maybe a middle ground here could be that for a tenant that wants to terminate a rental agreement for this purpose, perhaps they could provide documentationfrom a family doctor, or a shelter or an outreach group that deals with abuse and these types of things," he said.

Flight said he hasn't seen much opposition to the petition, and once he gets 500 signatures he plans to present it to Service NL Minister Sherry Gambin Walsh. As of Monday morning 383 people had signed it.

Flight is hopeful that once that happensgovernment will respond and implement the changes sooner rather than later.

"The support generally seems to be there, and it shouldn't cost too much money to implement," he said.

"So it seems like something that, where other provinces have already gone and done it, it shouldn't be too hard for us to do here."