Landlords owe nothing to tenants

Much has been written about a balance of social justice between the landlord and the tenant but I submit that it all amounts to a completely wrong approach to the meaning of justice. It should be beyond argument that justice, as far as the landlord is concerned, means his receiving a just return (market value) on his property. As far as the tenant is concerned, the application of the word justice surely means his paying a fair price for the use of the property.

The landlord owes nothing to the tenant. If the landlord has been deprived of justice for 75 years, the state has been the culprit and should bear the brunt of rectifying the injustice. There exists no balance between landlord and tenant to be adjusted.

In any other country tenants expect to pay up to one third of their income in rent. In the ideal world justice demands that rent restrictions should be removed entirely.

Admittedly, in this imperfect world this cannot be done immediately but until this is done the landlord is supporting the state and the tenant is not paying what is justly due. But let us not go on talking of a balance which suggests that anything on the scales has been weighted in favour of the landlord.

Many years ago a family in a village in Malta, out of its social conscience, rented spacious premises in prime sites to the two village band clubs and further rented a home to the bandmaster of one. Today, two generations later, the two band clubs are paying under €320 a year each, the bandmaster's family paying €95 a year. The landlord's family's social conscience has been worn rather thin and sees no balance of any kind, only imbalance.