“It’s risky, but so is not taking collective action of that sort,” he said. Tenants could face eviction or lower credit scores if they refuse to pay rent-not to mention the stress they endure, often for months at a time.īut Pater said it’s worth it. While rent strikes are noble, they do come with risks. When you interrupt the profits of corporate landlords, they take note, he said. “Rent strikes like these, taking organized action with your neighbours, is the best way to keep rents at an affordable level.” “It makes me hopeful for the first time in a little while when it comes to the situation of tenants,” he said in a Zoom interview. The grassroots group works with tenants to address their rights and the island’s lack of affordable housing. Strikes can also mobilize resources, shift public opinion and inspire others, Tranjan said.Ībsolutely, said Cory Pater, a staff member with PEI Fight For Affordable Housing. Tenants don’t always get what they want by striking, but the action can result in negotiations with a corporate landlord and provide a more equal balance of power, he said. Success can be difficult to measure, but generally, yes, Tranjan said. “Should we allow people to be evicted because we had to shut down the economy for public health reasons?” “It became a very clear moral conundrum,” he said. The pandemic was a galvanizing moment, Tranjan said. Ontario’s labour movement got involved in a “no COVID evictions” campaign. Rent strikes surfaced again as an issue in Canada and the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many lower-income workers lost their jobs and could not afford their rent. And in the United Kingdom, university students launched a string of rent strikes between 20. Tenants have staged strikes throughout the world, and throughout history, including strikes in Glasgow’s tenement buildings in the 1880s, in Barcelona in 1931 and in Harlem, N.Y., in 1963-4. ![]() In the 1860s, tenant farmers on Prince Edward Island formed a union and waged a rent strike against absentee farmers the Island’s government eventually took over the land. ![]() Rent strikes have a long history in Canada and other countries. Here’s what you need to know about rent strikes and what they could mean for tenants. “I think it speaks to how much they have been pushed to the limit by the overall housing situation and by a specific landlord that they would take such bold movement to withhold rent.” However, rent strikes are not without risks. Rent strikes in Canada are on the rise, and for good reason, according to Ricardo Tranjan, a political economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives in Ottawa. These strikes are not uncommon in Canada, with more than 300 tenants in 12 buildings in the Toronto neighbourhood of Parkdale going on strike for three months in 2017 and successfully fighting a substantial rent increase. In another part of the city, over 100 tenants in an apartment complex have also stopped paying rent to protest proposed above-guideline increases of almost 10% over the last two years. Longtime tenants have experienced six above-guideline rent increases in the past decade, leading to the strike. In Toronto, approximately 200 residents of a highrise building are currently on strike, refusing to pay rent as a form of protest against the building’s owners.
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