Residents have been calling for action to be taken against the ‘overconcentration of HMOs’
Campaigners have praised the newly formed council’s promise to improve regulation of HMOs in a cross-party agreement. Cambridge City Council voted in a new Labour leader on Monday night after an earlier meeting ended in deadlock.
The minority administration agreed to bring forward new controls to improve regulation of smaller HMOs and develop the case for an Article 4 Direction. This would require HMOs housing three to six people to seek full planning permission where currently this is only required for seven or more occupants.
Cllr Tim Bick, leader of the Liberal Democrat group, said: “This is a complex subject and the council may not have all the powers we would like it to have, but we want to deploy what we can to make whatever difference we can.”
Donna Ferguson, chair of Guest Road Area Residents’ Association in Petersfield, said she was “overjoyed” but also called for the council to consider a numerical threshold. She said almost a third of properties in their area are registered HMOs, meaning they house at least five people – but smaller HMOs do not need to be registered.
There are 58 parking spaces for the around 100 properties in the area, including the 32 HMOs which are entitled to three residential parking permits each.
Donna said the terraced homes, intended for families, now have “far more” adults than intended leading to fly-tipping as “there isn’t enough space for the bins”. She said the council’s local plan states that “overconcentration of HMOs” can “have a harmful impact on the community”.
She noted at least 51 local councils have already passed an Article 4 Direction, and “many of them uni towns – York, Manchester, Oxford”.
She said: “I just couldn’t understand why Cambridge, a uni town, doesn’t have these measures in place – I even saw that Peterborough had recently applied for an Article 4 Direction.”
At least 27 local authorities have also limited HMOs to a threshold of 10 per cent of properties within a certain radius – usually 50 to 100 metres – and Donna is calling for Cambridge to do the same.
She started a petition which has more than 100 signatures at the time of writing and you can visit here. Even with the council considering options, she said it’s “even more important now” to sign the petition to show there is support for the measure.
She said: “It’s not saying we want to stop HMOs – we really welcome students who have always been a part of our community, or tenants perhaps struggling with unaffordable rents. I know tenants who have come to us in the residents’ association to ask, ‘can you do anything? Our landlord won’t do anything’ – it’s the landlords, not the tenants.”
Donna said she hopes the stricter regulations will deter “speculative applications” from “potential venture capitalist developers”.
She said: “I’m very pleased and want to say thank you to the councillors who are supporting this – I think it’s fantastic and hope they can work together to do something.”
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