About 200 rally at place Jean-Paul-Riopelle against speculators as Lefebvre promises enforcement

About 200 people gathered at place Jean-Paul-Riopelle on Wednesday evening to demand the Quebec government end practices that push tenants out of their homes.

According to the Enquête report "Porte à tout prix," broadcast October 22, speculators buy buildings with still-low rents, raise them and increase market value at tenants' expense. The report found speculators boasting of profiting from tenants, especially seniors, by intimidating them. Several of the practices it described are fully legal, according to Québec solidaire. The party's petition has gathered more than 33,000 signatures.

The party says Quebec law still permits: deliberately targeting vulnerable people to push them to leave; pressuring tenants with fear into accepting unjustified rent increases; offering tenants money to leave their unit; and carrying out major works in a building solely to pass the bill to tenants. "J'ai été totalement horrifiée d'entendre les spéculateurs se vanter de faire de l'argent sur le dos des locataires," said Mme Ghazal of Québec solidaire at the rally. "Le statu quo ne peut plus durer." Andrés Fontecilla, also of Québec solidaire, called the new Housing minister "bien tranquille" and said previous governments "ont fermé les yeux" on the speculative market.

Elsie Lefebvre, the new minister of Habitation, said on X she had taken note of the "faits troublants" reported by Enquête. She attributed the abuses to an imbalance between supply and demand, promised to "faire observer la loi" and to increase social housing, and announced no change to the law.

Québec solidaire's proposals, set out in a June 29 release and again in November, include a rent freeze at inflation, a registry of leases, a tax on capital gains from selling rental buildings with an exemption for owner-occupants, higher fines at the Tribunal administratif du logement, and anonymised TAL decisions.