Premises used as political party clubs will fall within the new rent reform law as from January 1, 2010, Social Policy Minister John Dalli announced this afternoon. They had previously been excluded.

The minister was speaking after a meeting of the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development, where he updated the social partners on the outcome of the consultation process on rent reform.

He said the rent reform bill, due to be published on Tuesday, would feature several changes from the White Paper announced in the summer.

Among other things, he said the new law would not impinge on existing commercial contracts and in the case of commercial rents, the proposed thresholds on rents would be removed.

He said that premises occupied by social clubs would be governed by new regulations.

When a landlord sold a property to a tenant after having rented it to him for more than five years, withholding tax would be reduced to 3 percent.