Bill 6, the “Safer Municipalities Act” and Bill 10, the “Protect Ontario Through Safer Streets and Stronger Communities Act” have received Royal Assent in Ontario. These laws criminalize homeless and vulnerable populations and increase liability for landlords, including CCOC.
What is Bill 6 and what does it mean for people in Ontario?
Bill 6 would further criminalize homelessness, including fining up to $10,000 and/or imprisoning people for up to 6 months if they live outdoors or consume illegal substances in public. CCOC’s partner organization, the Alliance to End Homelessness Ottawa, along with other organizations in the sector, have been working to oppose this Bill and the criminalization of people facing homelessness, precarious living situations, and sheltering on public property.
If you’d like to learn more, visit the following link: CAEH – Response to Ontario’s reintroduction of the Safer Municipalities Act
What is Bill 10?
Bill 10 makes landlords directly responsible for preventing drug production and selling in the units they rent. It also gives police stronger powers when they suspect drug activity in the units. The Act is inequitable and unjust, and is likely to put vulnerable populations at even more risk.
What does Bill 10 mean for CCOC and other non-profit landlords?
- Landlords would be directly responsible for preventing drug related activity on their properties. This extends to directors and officers at CCOC.
- Landlords can avoid liability by demonstrating that they took “reasonable measures” to prevent the activity but “reasonable measures” are not clearly defined in the Act.
- This greater liability disproportionately affects non-profit landlords who provide housing for vulnerable populations, including people who use drugs.
- The Act creates a greater legal and administrative burden on non-profit landlords to decipher what “reasonable measures” are and enact them.
What does Bill 10 mean for tenants?
- The Act strengthens police powers, including the ability to remove people from premises, arrest people without warrants under some circumstances, seize items linked to criminal activity, and restrict access to buildings. This is especially concerning for tenants of non-profit housing organizations who are disproportionately marginalized populations who might be more severely harmed by empowered police.
- The Act may erode trust between tenants and landlords, as landlords would be forced to monitor tenant behaviour.
If you’d like to learn more, visit the follow link: Ontario Bill 10: New Responsibilities for Landlords in Preventing Illegal Drug Activity
You can also watch this interview with John Fox, a lawyer who specializes in non-profit housing.
What more can you do?
CCOC strongly opposes these bills and we invite our tenants and community to join us in asking the government to rescind them. Both Bill 6 and Bill 10 will likely be challenged in Ontario courts. You can sign a petition here to urge the government to rescind Bill 6. You can also share this blog post to spread the word about the harms these laws will cause.
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