Issue - meetings

That this Council:-

(a)       notes the report to Cabinet on 18 December 2013 on the Student Accommodation Strategy that warned of the risk that the provision of more purpose-built student accommodation will lead to over-supply and older blocks falling empty;

(b)       notes that the Council’s planning policy CS41 on “Creating mixed communities” requires a mix of tenures and sizes in large blocks of student accommodation and seeks to avoid over-saturation of student accommodation;

(c)        however, notes that many recent planning applications for very large blocks of student accommodation have been passed even where not complaint with policy CS41; and

(d)       therefore calls on the Administration to carry out an urgent re-assessment of the supply of and demand for student accommodation.