{"id":1843,"date":"2017-03-27T08:22:11","date_gmt":"2017-03-27T12:22:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wawa-news.com\/?p=1843"},"modified":"2017-03-25T08:42:50","modified_gmt":"2017-03-25T12:42:50","slug":"from-the-park-rent-increases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/2017\/03\/27\/from-the-park-rent-increases\/","title":{"rendered":"From the Park – Rent Increases"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mar 27, 2017 @ 08:22<\/strong><\/p>\n

This week New Democrats challenged the Liberal government on a new but important front that MPP offices receive many complaints about; rent increases. My colleagues and I hear from young renters who are worried that this might be the month they\u2019re hit with a rent hike they can\u2019t afford. We hear from families that say that the increases are chasing them from their homes \u2013 the place they\u2019re raising their kids. Seniors are not exempt from such pressures either.<\/p>\n

As it stands today in Ontario, rent increases are regulated to ensure tenants are able to afford to keep a roof over their heads.\u00a0 However, according to the Residential Tenancies Act<\/em>, only tenants living in buildings constructed before 1991 have rent increase caps which are based on annual rent increase guidelines. But those living in rental units built after 1991 have no such protection. Across the province we hear from constituents who are facing rent increases of hundreds of dollars or even $1,000 a month in some instances.\u00a0That\u2019s just not fair, and it doesn\u2019t have to be this way. The Wynne Liberals could have done something to eliminate this cruel loophole years ago but they chose not to. Well, now it\u2019s time to act.<\/p>\n

On Monday during Question Period Andrea Horwath called on Premier Kathleen Wynne to stop allowing devastatingly unfair rent hikes. Later that day the NDP tabled a bill that proposes closing this loophole that allows\u00a0landlords in buildings built later than 1991 to hike rents as much as they want, whenever they want.\u00a0 My colleagues and I will be working to pressure the government to bring this bill up for debate.<\/p>\n

No doubt you have been hearing and reading about how the Liberals have decided to resolve the mess they\u2019ve created with hydro in this province.\u00a0 Their answer is to download the horrific costs onto the backs of our generations to come. The Liberal strategy will cost the people of Ontario over $40 billion in interest charges. Think back for a moment about the advice your parents gave you about running long term balances on your credit card. Paying interest charges is like burning your money. The only ones that are happy with interest charges are the banks. Yes, the Liberals say it will result in lowering our hydro bills by up to 25% but at what cost and at whose expense?<\/p>\n

The NDP is not merely standing on the sideline and watching the parade of Liberal ads and radio promotions, paid for by the taxpayers of Ontario. You\u2019ll notice that the ads have the tag line, \u201cPaid for by the Government of Ontario.\u201d<\/em> (That\u2019s you.) So far, not one dime has come off people\u2019s sky-rocketing hydro bills and Wynne hasn\u2019t tabled legislation or even a credible plan to save us money. Yet, she\u2019s spending more of people\u2019s hard-earned dollars on ads claiming the problem is solved. In truth, it\u2019s all about Kathleen Wynne and her party, and not at all about making life more affordable for real people and real families who have been suffering day after day and month after month.<\/p>\n

You can see for yourself that New Democrats have stepped up to the plate by releasing a plan which realistically addresses this cataclysmic situation the successive Conservative and Liberal governments have created.\u00a0 Our plan will cut all hydro bills by as much as 30 percent. It will even reduce hydro costs to our hospitals thus allowing them to redirect that money to where it should be going – to the front lines where care is needed. Our plan will enable us to reverse the selloff of Hydro One and put it back into public hands as well as a number of immediate relief measures \u2013 such as eliminating time-of-use billing \u2013 and permanent fixes to the system.<\/p>\n

As for Patrick Brown and his Conservatives\u2026. We don\u2019t know what their plan is yet. But we do know that privatization is part of the Conservative\u2019s DNA.<\/p>\n

For further information and to compare the plans that each party is offering, try out our new webpage at ontariondp.ca\/comparetheplans<\/a>.<\/p>\n\"\"Michael Mantha is MPP for Algoma-Manitoulin.\u00a0He is currently the NDP Critic for Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation and NDP Critic for\u00a0Northern Development and Mines.\u00a0Michael Mantha is currently serving his second consecutive term as MPP for Algoma-Manitoulin. Constituents can reach his constituency office by email at mmantha-co@ndp.on.ca<\/a>\u00a0or by phone at 705-461-9710 or Toll free 1-800-831-1899.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mar 27, 2017 @ 08:22 This week New Democrats challenged the Liberal government on a new but important front that MPP offices receive many complaints about; rent increases. My colleagues …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1036,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-local"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-13 14:08:31","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1843"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1844,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1843\/revisions\/1844"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}