Last year I was approached by a resident of a local retirement village about the management’s refusal of his request to allow him to keep two budgerigars in a cage in his unit for some company. This was on the basis that a Village Rule prohibited the keeping of pets.
I advised him that under section 54 of the Retirement Villages Act 1999 (NSW) an application could be made to modify the Village Rule in its application to him on the basis that it was either “unjust…harsh or oppressive”. The application was lodged with the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal and was opposed by the retirement village.
The resident suffered from depression and lung cancer and had two support letters from medical practitioners stating that his well-being would benefit greatly from having the two caged birds.
Earlier this month the Tribunal decided that that the Village Rule banning pets was unjust and harsh in respect of the resident given his circumstances especially since his medical advisers said that pets would benefit his mental health.
Naturally, the whole exercise of having to go through bitterly fought legal proceedings was stressful for the resident. It might be time for the Retirement Villages Act to be amended in a similar way to the Strata Schemes Management Act 2015 (NSW) Act to allow the keeping of a pet unless it interferes with the rights of others.
April 2023