ADJUSTING RENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22579, 18 November 1936, Page 14

ADJUSTING RENTS

ACTIVITIES UNDER ACT NUMEROUS AGREEMENTS REVIEW BY MINISTER I A TRIBUTE TO OWNERS [llV TELKGBAPH —OWN CORRESPONDENT ] WELLINGTON, Tuesday "The number of applications throughout, New Zealand under the provisions of the Fair Rents Act is the clearest proof of the necessity for the legislation," paid the Minister of Labour, the Hon. H. T. Armstrong, in an interview. "The department is exceptionally busy in various centres and officials are doing good work in investigating complaints and bringing about conferences as between landlords and tenants. ~ , "By far the best feature, continued Mr. Armstrong, "has been the attitude of property owners generally, Ihe majority have shown willingness to make adjustments and enter into new agreements with tenants wherever the circumstances appear to be reasonable. Of course, a certain number oi applications have required magisterial consideration, but that was inevitable. Such cases, however, are by no means substantial compared with the high proportion of applications settled satisfactorily by agreement between the principal parties and subsequently a I proved by the Labour Department. Auckland and Wellington "A detailed enumeration of all applications for determination and fixation of a fair rent has not yet been made, officials of the depar" ment having concentrated on the more pressing work or promoting adjustments. It ' ia^ Ari en i o*.° r ,fi that approximately 500 cases have ready been dealt with by the Labour Department in Auckland, fhat is true, but, busy as the Auckland officials have been during the past three months, the activity in Wellington ha. been much greater. "The exact number of applications in the Wellington district is not available at the moment, but the total to date is considerably in excess of the Auckland aggregate. This was to be expected in the special circumstances which mark the housing problem in Wellington, where rentals always have been higher than in the other main centres of population. Moreover, there is no immediate prospect of a pronounced falling-off in the weekly number of applications. The department in Wellington will be busy for some time yet. Dunedin Difficulty "Dunedin is just beginning to get the benefit of the Act," continued Mr. Armstrong. "However, difficulty is being exj)eriencftd there owing to the fact that there has been no valuation of property since 1920. Values to-day are in manv instances very different from what they were 16 years ago and consequently rental adjustment is a more difficult problem. Ihe Labour Department, however, is doing everything possible within the provisions of the 7\ct to bring about satisfactory adjustments of rents."