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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 11 Hansard (6 November) . . Page.. 3778 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Mr Speaker, this is now necessary because of the retention of the cap in the provisions dealing with abandonment of a lease. Proposed section 106A deals with a situation where a tenant gives notice to quit a lease without any justification that might be described as hardship, which is dealt with elsewhere in the legislation. We are inserting here, in effect, mirror provisions to those which appear in clause 61. That means that there is no incentive for a tenant to abandon the lease as opposed to giving the landlord notice. If it were not for this provision it would be in the tenant's interest to abandon the lease because in that situation there would be a cap for 25 weeks' rent that could be collected from him, whereas if he gave notice there would be no limit on the amount that he might have to pay. That, obviously, would be inequitable; so this puts in place a cap in respect of giving notice of termination of a tenancy.

MS TUCKER (6.07): The Greens will be supporting this amendment moved by Mr Humphries. It is basically consequential on the result of amendment No. 30.

Amendment agreed to.

MS TUCKER (6.07): I move:

Page 50, line 33, after clause 123, insert the following new clause:

"Water efficient appliances

123A. (1) This section applies to an appliance, a fitting or a fixture that uses or supplies water and is provided by a lessor at premises that are the subject of a residential tenancy agreement.

(2) A lessor shall ensure that where an appliance, a fitting or a fixture to which this section applies is replaced, the replacement has at least an AA rating.

(3) Where -

(a) a lessor breaches subsection (2); and

(b) but for this subsection, the tenant would be liable to pay the cost of water supplied to the relevant premises;

the lessor is liable to pay the cost of water supplied to the relevant premises from the date of the breach until such time as the relevant appliance, fitting or fixture is replaced by an appliance, a fitting or a fixture that does have at least an AA rating.

(4) For the purposes of the definition of `tenancy dispute' in subsection 3(1), an application by a tenant to the Tribunal for payment by the lessor of an amount which the lessor is liable to pay under subsection (3) is an application for compensation under this Act.

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