Changes to tenancy, privacy and guardianship laws
The Justice and Community Safety Legislation Amendment Act 2025 (No 3) makes changes to improve several laws.
About the reform
The Act changes several laws to better help you if:
- you breach your Drug and Alcohol Treatment Order
- you are treated unfairly because of a previous criminal conviction
- you have a privacy complaint
- you need to become a guardian or manager for someone with impaired decision-making capacity
- you need to give a tenant a condition report at the start of a tenancy
- you are a tenant or a landlord who wants to end a tenancy using the posting clause
- you need to give information to someone buying your unit in a complex with a pool.
Drug and Alcohol Treatment Order breaches
The Crimes (Sentencing) Act 2005 has changed what happens if you breach your Drug and Alcohol Treatment Order (DATO).
If you have breached a Drug and Alcohol Treatment Order, other than by committing an offence, you can go to the Magistrates Court instead of the Supreme Court if the Supreme Court is not in session.
This helps you by allowing you to be seen more quickly by the courts. It will also protect the community if you haven’t been following your treatment order.
Unfair treatment because of a spent conviction
The Discrimination Act 1991 has changed. If you are treated unfairly by an organisation because of a spent conviction, your spent conviction may be an irrelevant criminal record and the unfair treatment you receive may be unlawful discrimination.
The Spent Convictions Act 2000 lets people look at spent convictions on some occasions, where this helps to protect vulnerable people. For example, if you are applying for a position relating to the care of children.
This change makes it clear that it is not unlawful discrimination for someone to look at your spent conviction, if the Spent Convictions Act 2000 allows this, and your spent conviction is relevant to the situation.
Information privacy complaints
The Information Privacy Act 2014 changes how the Information Privacy Commissioner handles complaints. The Commissioner looks after complaints where a government agency has not met its legal responsibilities to look after your personal information.
The Commissioner will have more options to be able to help resolve complaints. The Commissioner will be able to help you and the agency you are complaining about resolve a complaint through a process called conciliation. Conciliation can be done in many ways to suit your needs, and makes it easier for people to communicate, understand the problem and find a solution together.
Guardianship or manager applications
The Guardianship and Management of Property Act 1991 has changed how you can provide information to the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal (ACAT).
If you need to be a guardian or manager for someone with impaired decision-making capacity, you need to let the ACAT know about certain matters. This could include a previous conviction or issues relating to financial circumstances like bankruptcy.
In addition to providing information on oath, you can also let the ACAT know about your matter by giving them a statutory declaration. This lets you choose how you want to give information to ACAT.
This change also validates previous occasions where ACAT relied on information provided by statutory declaration by a guardian or manager.
Condition reports and posting clauses in tenancy agreements
The Residential Tenancies Act 1997 makes changes for condition reports and the posting termination clause in tenancy agreements.
At the start of a tenancy agreement, landlords must give tenants a condition report. A condition report is a record of a property's condition at the start of a tenancy.
Changes to the Residential Tenancies Act 1997 allow condition reports to be shared electronically, if the tenant agrees. A condition report does not need to be a paper copy.
The tenant must be able to edit the electronic condition report to give their comments.
Some tenancy agreements may include a posting clause. A posting clause allows the tenant or landlord to end the tenancy agreement early if they are moving to or from the ACT for work.
The tenant or landlord must:
- give 8 weeks’ notice
- provide proof, like a letter from their employer, to confirm they are moving for work.
Changes to the Residential Tenancies Act 1997 now allow tenants who have received an 8 week notice from their landlord to leave earlier without penalty.
If they are leaving earlier, the tenant must give their landlord:
- at least two weeks’ notice of their intention to vacate, or
- four days’ notice, if they are leaving within the last two weeks of the landlord’s 8 week notice.
The posting clause will also apply to the tenant or landlord’s spouse or domestic partner, if they are moving to or from the ACT for work.
Swimming pool safety information when selling your unit
If you are selling your unit and there is a swimming pool on the common property of the unit complex, you need to give information to potential buyers about the pool’s safety.
The Civil Law (Sale of Residential Property) Act 2003 specifies that this safety information is in the unit titles sale certificate that you request from the owners corporation. You do not need to give the information separately to the buyer.
Next steps
The changes introduced by the Justice and Community Safety Legislation Amendment Act (No 3) will start at different times. This is because some of the changes are bigger than others.
Most of the updated laws will be in effect from 13 September.
Changes for electronic condition reports for rentals and posting termination clauses will be in effect for any tenancy agreements started on or after 12 October 2025.
Related information
ACT Human Rights Commission - Complaints About Breaches of Privacy