Indisputable! Undeniable! Confirmed and Verified by Rich Coleman, Minister Responsible for Housing
Retrieved under Freedom of Information
recently, the
attached letter from Rich Coleman, Minister Responsible for Housing,
responds to the issue of secondhand smoke seeping from one unit to
another in multi-unit complexes.
While this standardized letter responds
to the matter of secondhand smoke under the Strata Property Act,
non-profits and market rentals each have their own Acts
mentioning the section of quiet enjoyment and health standards.
Rich Coleman cites Raith v Coles(1984), which I include under Case Law, stating that “no matter
what bylaws are in place, the common law of Nuisance allows a strata
resident bothered by smoke to take another strata resident of the
complex to court to request an order that the smoking cease.”
Rich
Coleman states that [secondhand smoke] “is not simply an
issue between neighbours,” and
that when “someone causes a nuisance, Strata Councils,
must enforce the bylaws by taking steps to deal with the nuisance.”
The
common law of Nuisance, as written into the various Acts
governing housing “prohibits an owner, tenant, occupant,
or visitor from causing a nuisance or hazard to another person,”
and that, “...loud noise, smoking or bad odours may all
fall under this bylaw.”
People
write to their MLA's, the Premier's Office, and to the Ministry's of
Health and Housing, asking that the government modify the housing
Acts to include
secondhand smoke, to make it clear and unequivocal. After six years,
this kind of amendment never happened, because, technically, it
doesn't need to. Mr. Coleman's standardized response now confirms
that. The responsible persons remain the managers and landlords and
councils and boards to enforce under existing bylaws and common laws,
be it Nuisance, or Human Rights or Residential Tenancy (RTB).
RTB
decisions retrieved under Freedom of Information at the same time,
show an increase in cases filed by tenants and landlords, as well as
better written decisions by Dispute Resolution Officers. The
weakness I see in the decisions remains that both tenants and
landlords do a poor job of gathering evidence and presenting it. Of
course, the Dispute Resolution Officer, and any adjudicator, can only
decide on the oral and written evidence presented.
The
documents retrieved under Freedom of Information (emails, government
form letters, RTB decisions) provide a glimpse of the struggle
everyday people experience with secondhand smoke. I characterized
previous standardized, form letters as dismissive. I classify these
new form letters as informative.
In the
meantime, the Quebec
Tobacco Trials continue to be intriguing, chipping away at the
notion that Big Tobacco is too big to fail. Fabulous.
In the
US, Big
Tobacco R J Reynolds loses to Eileen Clinton, with an award
payout of $1.34 million. Eileen Clinton sued R J Reynolds on behalf
of her deceased husband, to make good on his bequest. Robert Gavin
reports in the TimesUnion.com that the verdict against R J Reynolds
is thought to be the first federal jury verdict in favor of a former
smoker.
Verified:
Secondhand Smoke Is Not Simply An Issue Between Neighbours
