Urban decay is no stranger to most Canadian cities. Mold has claimed many a building in Vancouver. And Toronto is fighting a losing war against infestations of pesky cockroaches.

Manitoba, however, may have better luck exterminating a far more menacing vermin - rent control. Introduced by the NDP in 1970 to curb rising rents, the rent control law has since put in motion a chain of events that have crippled the city.

Rent control is a throwback to the central planned economy where prices and wages are fixed by government decree. To keep accommodation costs low, rent control arbitrarily caps rate increases below market value. The average one percent annual rate increase hardly keeps pace with inflation.

The wrecker's ball is a fitting metaphor for the devastation meted out by rent control on the city's housing and rental building stock. Government meddling in price setting prevents landlords from maximizing the potential of their property investment. In fact, it discourages refurbishment and construction of low priced rental units and diverts investment to activities that fetch a higher rate of return. The rent control wrecker's ball has effectively eclipsed the crane from gracing the city skyline.

Neglect of rental properties is the first casualty. Vacancy in Winnipeg remains low and the quality of low cost accommodation leaves much to be desired.

The baying hyenas of rent control are terrified that without government regulation, rents will become unaffordable. First of all, the housing market in Winnipeg has been steady and affordable for years. Unregulated rents will likely keep on an even keel as well.

Second, when the Saskatchewan NDP scrapped rent control in 1992, the sky didn't fall on Chicken Little's apartment suite. On the contrary, statistics from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy show that average rents in Regina remained flat five years later. Today, Manitoba is one of the last provinces in the country to set rental rates for landlords.

As a tenant a few years back, rent control discouraged my landlord from making improvements to the apartment block. The landlord couldn't break even on the investment. So not unlike most people, I put up with the shoddy digs.

Now as a homeowner, I'm faced with the same dilemma. Improvements to my home are deferred to a later date on account of remarkably high property taxes - an offshoot of rent control.

Rent control drives property taxes up for homeowners by reducing the assessment value of rental units. After twenty years of the rent control regime, the capital value of buildings has deteriorated. As property assessments fall, the city's tax take form rental units decreases. To make up for the shortfall, the property tax burden is shifted to homeowners who must now subsidize tenants for the same city services.

According to the Frontier Centre, the hidden transfer from homeowners to tenants in the form of high property taxes is between $600 and $700 per year.

Not content with Winnipeg's high property tax-for-service ratio, many homeowners are relocating outside the perimeter, causing Winnipeg's tax base to erode even further. Those left behind are saddled with a larger share of the government's bill.

The province's rent control law has made sacrificial lambs of homeowners, muted the return on landlords' property investment and forced many low-income earners to live in squalor.

Before the election, the NDP promised to lessen the tax burden on property owners. Once elected, they raised the property tax credit. The NDP should go one step further and pull the plug on rent control.