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53B: Special provisions for notice terminating social housing tenancies
or “Rules for ending social housing rentals when tenants no longer qualify or need to move”
You could also call this:

“The Tenancy Tribunal can stop a landlord from ending a tenancy if they did it to get back at the tenant for exercising their rights.”

If you’re renting a place and your landlord gives you a notice to end your tenancy, you have the right to challenge it if you think it’s unfair. You can do this within 28 working days of getting the notice. This applies to normal tenancies and boarding house tenancies.

You can ask the Tenancy Tribunal to say that the notice doesn’t count. You might do this if you think your landlord is trying to kick you out because you’ve used your rights as a tenant or made a complaint about them.

If you go to the Tribunal, they’ll look at why your landlord gave you the notice. If they agree that your landlord was trying to get back at you for using your rights or complaining, they’ll usually say the notice doesn’t count. But if they think you were being really annoying or unreasonable with your complaints, they might still let the notice stand.

It’s important to know that if the Tribunal says the notice doesn’t count, it means your landlord has done something against the law by giving you that notice.

Remember, the notice from your landlord needs to follow the rules in section 51 (or section 66U for boarding houses) to be valid in the first place.

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Next up: 55: Termination on non-payment of rent, damage, or assault

or “Ending a rental agreement when tenants don't pay rent, cause damage, or hurt others”
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Part 2 Tenancy agreements
Termination of tenancies and recovery of possession

54Tribunal may declare retaliatory notice of no effect

  1. Within 28 working days after receipt of a notice terminating the tenancy, being a notice that complies with the requirements of section 51 (or, in the case of a boarding house tenancy, section 66U), the tenant may apply to the Tribunal for an order declaring that the notice is of no effect on the ground that, in giving the notice, the landlord was motivated wholly or partly by the exercise or proposed exercise by the tenant of any right, power, authority, or remedy conferred on the tenant by the tenancy agreement or by this or any other Act or any complaint by the tenant against the landlord relating to the tenancy.

  2. If, on any such application, the Tribunal is satisfied that the landlord was so motivated in giving the notice, it shall declare the notice to be of no effect unless the Tribunal is satisfied that the purported exercise by the tenant of any such right, power, authority, or remedy, or the making by the tenant of any such complaint, was or would be vexatious or frivolous to such an extent that the landlord was justified in giving the notice.

  3. The giving of a notice terminating a tenancy is an unlawful act if the notice is declared under subsection (2) to be of no effect.

Compare
  • Residential Tenancies Act 1978–1981 ss 66 (SA)
Notes
  • Section 54(1): amended, on , by section 16(1) of the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2016 (2016 No 26).
  • Section 54(1): amended, on , by section 36 of the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2010 (2010 No 95).
  • Section 54(3): inserted, on , by section 16(2) of the Residential Tenancies Amendment Act 2016 (2016 No 26).