The 'owner' of an apartment holds his/her title by way of a long leasehold interest e.g. 999 years or more. The leasehold interest really only covers the box or shell of the apartment i.e. the surfaces of the walls, floors and ceilings. Any structural or load bearing walls form part of the reserved property and are owned by the management company.
As part of the lease each apartment owner is granted certain easements, rights and privileges such as the right to pass over the internal and external common areas to access the apartment. However, all of the easements, rights and privileges are invariably stated in the lease to be subject to and conditional upon:
(a) The owner being a member of the management company, and;
(b) The owner complying with the covenants, obligations, agreements, stipulations and restrictions on his part in the lease (the most important one obviously being the obligation to pay a service charge).
Therefore strictly speaking under the terms of the lease a management company is within its rights to deny non-paying owners the services, easements, rights and priviliges contained in the lease, including the right to pass over the common areas. However, most management company exercise such rights sparingly and only as a last resort when other debt recovery strategies have failed to deliver the desired results.