PARLIAMENT ENDS DISCUSSION ON LEASE OF FLATS

ZAGREB, Oct 10 (Hina) - The Croatian Parliament's House of Representatives on Thursday continued a discussion on the Apartment Leasing Bill. In an explanation of the bill, Deputy Housing Minister Vladimir Krtalic said the Government had tried to find solutions to the conflicting interests of the former apartment owners and the current tenants "which won't be more unfavourable than the existing ones." The bill regulates relations between the tenants who were granted tenancy rights to apartments confiscated after 1945 and the former owners of these flats. The Denationalization Bill provides that confiscated apartments will be returned to the former owners or their heirs once removed, but the current tenants will be allowed to occupy them for the next ten years during which they will pay rent below the market price. According to the Apartment Leasing Bill, if the owner of a apartment wants to sell it, he or she must first offer the purchase to the protected lessee of that flat. Proposing several amendments, the Parliament's legislation and labour and welfare policy committees supported the bill, whereas different parties' deputies evaluated it variously. Social and Democratic Party (SDP) and Istrian Democratic Assembly (IDS) parliamentarians demanded that the bill should go into the third reading, and they along with Croatian Social and Liberal Party (HSLS) members held that the bill could not be discussed without the Government's strategy of the housing policy. Croatian Peasants' Party (HSS) deputies considered the bill as unfair both to former owners, who will be forced to lease apartments, and to tenants with the tenancy rights to the apartments in question but who will not be allowed the right to purchase the flats as other tenants in the country. (hina) jn vm mš 101649 MET oct 96