The Protecting Tenants and Strengthening Community Housing Act, 2020 (Bill 184, 2020; French: Loi visant la protection des locataires et le renforcement du logement communautaire) is a law in the province of Ontario that brought a number of changes to regulations surrounding rented housing in the province.
[1] The bill made a number of amendments to the Residential Tenancies Act, 2006 and the Housing Services Act, 2011, including giving landlords the power to offer tenants take-it-or-leave-it repayment plans, bypassing the Landlord and Tenant Board, and allowing landlords to make applications for arrears of rent up to twelve months after the tenant left the rental unit.
Many critics accused the government of favouring landlords and eroding protections for tenants, which was of especially grave concern considering the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
[7] Opposition critic for tenant rights and NDP MPP for Toronto Centre Suze Morrison called for the government to "scrap its plan to make evictions easier and step up with rent relief to help see tenants through the economic pain of COVID-19.
[11] The Institute for Research on Public Policy stated that the bill "has opened the door to a wave of evictions, which will be disproportionately targeted at low-income tenants experiencing intersecting vulnerabilities.