A $10-million overrun in provincial programs to help tenants cover skyrocketing rents has renewed calls to introduce rent controls in Alberta.

The Stelmach government set up two funds this spring worth $40 million to help people facing huge rent hikes or evictions. Now six months later, the province has handed out all of the money, plus an extra $10 million and counting.

Provincial programs to help cover rising rents have doled out $50 million since May, more than budgeted.Provincial programs to help cover rising rents have doled out $50 million since May, more than budgeted.
(CBC)

The additional cost to the province is rekindling calls to cap how much landlords can charge tenants.

Gordon Watt, who saw his rent double to $1,425 last month, wants the premier to bring in some sort of limit.

"Even if he would have said 10 per cent — a $75 increase in my rent would have been easier to swallow than a $725 increase," Watt said.

But Housing Minister Ray Danyluk reiterated the province's position that rent controls won't solve the crisis.
 
"We need to develop more units and implementing rent control will not increase the supply of affordable housing," he said, arguing that investors will not build new units when they know their profits are limited by rental caps. 

'Get off your ideological hobby horse. Recognize that even if people started building affordable rental units it would take time.'— Ray Martin, NDP MLA

NDP MLA Ray Martin still isn't convinced. He was a member of an all-party provincial housing task force that recommended introducing rent controls, an idea soundly rejected by the Tory government.

"Get off your ideological hobby horse. Recognize that even if people started building affordable rental units it would take time. In the short term, do what we asked for: temporary rent guidelines," said Martin.
 
The Parkland Institute, a research group, said the subsidies are too expensive, while rent controls don't cost taxpayers anything.
 
"That doesn't mean no rent increase, it means that rent increases are kept within reasonable limits and we do protect low-income workers," said Diana Gibson, the group's research director.