Skip to main content

Improving energy efficiency in rental units

Thursday morning, I spoke on Bill 222, a Private Member's bill which looks to improve the energy efficiency of rental units in Manitoba.   My comments, from Hansard, are below:

Hon. Jon Gerrard (River Heights): Madam Speaker, just a few remarks on this legislation. I think that the legislation acknowledges two important items, one of which is the fact that tenants' costs are significant and that we as legislators should be looking very carefully at ways that we can help with the situation in Manitoba where tenant costs have been high and have been rising. And, certainly, if there's things that we can do in that respect, that would be good.

      And reducing the energy costs is certainly a reasonable approach, and certainly, at a time when we're looking at addressing climate change, when we're looking at improving energy efficiency all over the province, that rental units are a good area to be looking at in terms of what the opportunities are for improving the energy efficiency of buildings and for upgrading buildings.
      In order to work, this measure, I think, would need to have some further discussions with landlords. And, certainly, in order to be workable, I suspect that it would be best with some sort of subsidy for rehabilitation of rental units and upgrading of rental units. I think that this is an area where a dialogue would certainly be helpful and that bringing this to committee stage so that we could have that extended dialogue and bring in and to have people who are landlords and tenants come in and talk about this area, which is, I think, a useful area for us to be looking at.
      So I hope that members will bring this forward to committee stage so that, in fact, we can have that discussion. Whether this bill as it is is the right answer, I'm not so sure, but I do believe that having that discussion and looking at this area as an area where we could improve our energy efficiency province-wide is certainly a good idea.
      Thank you.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Comparison between Manitoba and South Dakota shows dramatic impact of Physical Distancing

Manitoba implemented physical distancing measures in mid-March.  South Dakota has still not made physical distancing mandatory.   The result is a dramatic difference in the incidence of covid-19 viral infections between the two jurisdictions.   This graph shows the number of people with Covid-19 infections from March 27 to April 14.  Manitoba ( red line )  started leveling off about April 4 and has seen only a small increase in Covid-19 infections since then.   South Dakota ( blue line )   has seen a dramatic increase in Covid-19 infections since April 4.  Those who are skeptical of the impact of physical distancing in Manitoba should look at this graph! Data are from the Johns Hopkins daily tabulations
18 comments
Read more

Pushing for safe consumption sites and safe supply to reduce overdose deaths

  On Monday June 20th, Thomas Linner of the Manitoba Health Coalition, Arlene Last-Kolb Regional Director of Moms Stop the Harm and Winnipeg City Councillor Sherri Rollins were at the Manitoba Legislature to advocate for better measures to reduce deaths from drug overdoses, most particularly for safe consumption sites and for a safe supply, measures which can reduce overdose deaths.  
Post a Comment
Read more

Manitoba Liberal accomplishments

  Examples of Manitoba Liberal accomplishments in the last three years Ensured that 2,000 Manitoba fishers were able to earn a living in 2020   (To see the full story click on this link ). Introduced a bill that includes retired teachers on the Pension Investment Board which governs their pension investments. Introduced amendments to ensure school aged children are included in childcare and early childhood education plans moving forward. Called for improvements in the management of the COVID pandemic: ·          We called for attention to personal care homes even before there was a single case in a personal care home. ·            We called for a rapid response team to address outbreaks in personal care homes months before the PCs acted.  ·          We called for a science-based approach to preparing schools to   improve ventilati...
Post a Comment
Read more