Residential evictions banned in Ontario during state of emergency

Situations are considered "urgent" when they involve issues like illegal activity taking place on the premises.

Steve Clark, the Minister for Municipal Affairs and Housing, said:

“Our government will ensure that residential evictions continue to be paused for the remainder of the state of emergency, as long as it lasts."

"We’re encouraging landlords and tenants to work together—as they have been doing for the last several months—to ensure that we keep Ontarians safe … We want to remind tenants who can pay their rent that they must continue to do so, to the best of their abilities."

According to Global News, The Landlord and Tenant Board will still be in session as it normally would, and will continue to hear cases and make decisions normally.

Enforcement of eviction orders, however, will be put on pause until such time as there is no longer a state of emergency.

There is also legislation in place protecting some, but not all, commercial evictions.

The current state of emergency was declared on Tuesday, and is programmed to last for 28 days from that day, with the possibility of it being extended.

These events are effectively a repeat of what happened last summer, and have been enacted for the same reason, that being the amount of people occupying ICU beds and the strain being placed on Ontario's healthcare system.