Councillor Turner arrived during the debate on this item.

Councillor Brown, seconded by Councillor Rowley, proposed her submitted motion as set out in the agenda and briefing note.

Councillor Gant, seconded by Councillor Landell Mills, proposed his submitted amendment as set out in the briefing note.

After debate and on being put to the vote, the amendment was declared lost.

After debate and on being put to the vote, the original motion was agreed.

Council resolved to adopt the following motion:

Council believes that Oxford is in the midst of a housing crisis, affecting all sections of our city, from people who grew up here but cannot afford to live here any more, families spanning several generations forced to live in one house because grown-up children cannot afford to move out, through to those who need to move on from hostel provision but can find nowhere to move to, and those who end up sleeping on the streets. 

Council believes that a wide variety of factors are responsible for this housing crisis, including decades of under-investment in social housing, and in particular a reckless disregard by central government for the potential that council housing could play in solving the housing crisis.

Council further believes that, notwithstanding the city’s determination to free up land for development, there is no ability to build enough dwellings to meet our housing needs within the city’s boundaries, and therefore sustainable urban extensions, with a good proportion of genuinely affordable housing and nomination rights for the City Council are a necessary part of the solution. 

Consideration should be given to taking further land out of Oxfordshire’s Green belt to facilitate this as has happened elsewhere. The emerging National Planning Policy Framework recognises that in exceptional circumstances this can be a sustainable way to plan to meet housing needs, including allocating new land as Green belt by way of compensation.

Council resolves to ask the City Executive Board to continue to make appropriate representations to our neighbouring councils on this matter, to feed such views into emerging sub-regional planning arrangements, and for the Leader to write to both local MPs asking for their views on this matter and their support.