AD to petition for rent laws referendum

Alternattiva Demokratika will soon launch a nation-wide petition to hold a referendum on liberalising the country's rent laws.

Contacted yesterday, AD's chairman Harry Vassallo said that given the fact that there were 304,283 registered voters, a total of 30,428 signatures would be required (10 per cent of the registered voters, as laid down by law) so that a referendum would take place.

"We tried to make this an issue in the 2003 election campaign. But both the Nationalist Party and the Malta Labour Party ignored it. The President mentioned the need to reform rent laws in his speech at the opening of Parliament. But the Prime Minister has since indicated that the reform of rent laws was not on the agenda for this legislature as he wants a guarantee from the MLP that it would not resort to requisitioning houses before any reform takes place.

"When one considers that 25 per cent of the property is empty because of the rent laws situation, it is high time that a referendum is held to change the laws.

"We want rent laws liberalised so that people will be able to rent rather than go to the property market to buy," Dr Vassallo said.

AD is expected to give details of its referendum campaign shortly.