The Quebec Minister of Housing, France-Élaine Duranceau, believes she has reached a point of “balance” and will not go any further in her bill on evictions to protect senior tenants.
The legislative text she tabled on May 21 sets three conditions to determine whether an elderly person will be protected from evictions. She must be 65 years old or over, have resided in her home for at least 10 years and have an income equivalent to a maximum of 125% of the threshold giving access to low-income housing (HLM).
Québec solidaire proposes to increase this last threshold to 150%. In Montreal, this amount would then be equivalent to $57,000; it is currently $38,000 and would be $47,500 under the current version of the bill.
In a press scrum on Thursday, Minister Duranceau rejected this proposal. “I think at 125% it’s balanced. Beyond that, it is not optimal for maintaining a balance in the ecosystem,” she said.
“In balance”
She reiterated that her proposal “was in balance”, both for tenants and owners. “The two elements on which we acted were those which had the most impact. And what we are also told is that the people we are trying to protect with this bill, generally, have been in their homes for well over 10 years,” she added.
By increasing the threshold from 100% to 125% of that giving access to HLM, the Duranceau cabinet estimates protecting 24,000 additional households, for a total of 60,000.
Québec solidaire also announced in the afternoon that it intended to return to the charge by demanding to protect seniors who have lived in their homes for five years, and not 10.
Minister Duranceau’s bill must be adopted by June 7 to come into force. In order to speed up its adoption, deputies from all parties agreed to send it immediately for detailed study, without holding consultations. “I think everyone is in a state of mind to move things forward quickly so that, obviously, it has a concrete impact quickly on people’s lives. So, I [suis] very attentive, but also very determined to move things forward,” assured the Minister of Housing.
“There are only 13 articles” in this legislative text, she also underlined.