Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to introduce an act to Amend the Commercial Tenancies Act. This bill will amend the Commercial Tenancies

Act to ensure that a judge of the supreme court is available to conduct a hearing on the day that a tenant is required, by an eviction summons, to show cause why an order should not be made for delivering possession of leased premises. Currently subsection 41(3) of the act authorizes the issuance of an eviction summons that calls on a tenant to appear before a judge of the supreme court three days after the service of the summons. This is, however, as we have learned, an impractical method of scheduling a hearing because it assumes that a judge of the supreme court will always be available to hold one and this is not the case. It would be preferable if, as the bill provides, the hearing was scheduled by the clerk of supreme court when issuing the summons for a day when the judge is known to be available. The bill will also ensure that the eviction summons is served on the tenant at least three days prior to the day of the show cause hearing. Those are my introductory remarks, Mr. Chairman.