To hear questions from the public in accordance with Council Procedure Rule 11.9 to the Leader or other Board Members of the City Executive Board for which the required notice (1.00pm on Thursday 15^th December 2011) and the full wording of the question has been given to the Head of Law and Governance and to hear responses from those Members.

Three questions were submitted by Members of the public, however due to the time limit allowed for addresses to Council and questions from members of the public being reached, the following questions would receive a written response and the response would be addend to the minutes for information.

(1)       Question to the Board Member, City Development (Councillor Colin Cook) from Sietske Boeles 

            Current and future student accommodation units

How confident is the City Council about the soundness of  the evidence base for the calculation of the number of current and future student units for Oxford Brookes University by excluding the accommodation needs for those students who live in Oxford but are based at either the  Wheatley or Harcourt Hill campus. Have sufficient sites been identified to meet the accommodation needs for those fulltime OBU students who are based at Harcourt and Wheatley campuses but live in Oxford? . 

The calculation for the current and future (till 2026) need of Oxford Brookes University’s student accommodation is based on the  number of full time OBU students based in Oxford and seems to exclude the 5000 or so full time  students  based outside Oxford’s  administrative  boundaries such as those  studying at Harcourt Hill and the Wheatley campus. Presumably the accommodation needs of these students have been excluded because the City Council has no planning controls in relation to developments in other district councils.

Oxford Core Strategy Examination Document C/M5/7 says on page 3 (appended):

Oxford Brookes University-number of students 2006/7

Oxford Brookes University fulltime students           12.690

Full time students based in Oxford                       7,075

Units of student accommodation                          3,742

Students living outside provided accommodation  3,425

(shortfall 425)

Percentage of students in provided accommodation   53% 

Source AMR 07/08

On the basis of these figures the impact of the cumulative annual growth of 1% in full time students at OBU, based in Oxford, over the remaining plan period would be an increase of 1,472 students and when the shortfall of student accommodation at 2006/7 (425) is added that indicates that at the projected growth of OBU they will need to provide 1,897 more units of accommodation by 2026. Sites seem therefore to have been  identified  for students based in Oxford only.

OBU has confirmed that substantial numbers of students who are based at Harcourt Hill and Wheatley live in Oxford both in provided accommodation as in the private sector.  How are the accommodation needs of these students going to be met? 

Written response provided after the meeting as follows:

The question asks about the accommodation needs of Oxford Brookes University students who live in Oxford but are based at either the Wheatley or Harcourt Hill campuses.  It is acknowledged that many students who are based at these campuses may live within Oxford City.  The figures which Oxford Brookes has provided to the City Council in recent years for the Annual Monitoring Report are based on a postcode analysis of all students who live within Oxford City.  These figures are ‘campus blind’, i.e. they do not distinguish where students study, only where they live.  The data presented in the Annual Monitoring Report therefore reflects the accommodation situation of the totality of full-time students at Oxford Brookes, whether they study inside or outside the city boundary.

The question also refers to the City Council’s statement to the Core Strategy examination regarding student accommodation, in which a calculation was made of future demand that excluded Oxford Brookes students studying outside of the city boundary.

The reason for this is that the policy being considered at the Core Strategy examination (Policy CS25 in the adopted plan) aims, amongst other things, to ensure that all future increases in student numbers at the two universities as a result of increases in academic/administrative floorspace must be matched by a corresponding increase in purpose-built student accommodation.  The policy can only be implemented as and when proposals come forward for new academic floorspace within the city.  Since Oxford City Council has no planning control over sites outside the city boundary, the Council's statement to the Core Strategy examination did not deal with students based outside the city.

In practice, some of the accommodation needs of students based at Wheatley and Harcourt Hill may be met outside the city (e.g. a new hall of residence is being built at Harcourt Hill), while some may be met within the city.  The Proposed Submission version of the Sites and Housing DPD allocates 24 sites as potentially suitable for new student accommodation, while other sites may come forward through speculative proposals. It is likely that students based at Wheatley or Harcourt Hill may occupy some of this future student accommodation.

If the questioner is concerned that the Core Strategy may have underestimated the future demand for student accommodation by excluding students based at Wheatley and Harcourt Hill, I would add that at the time of preparing the Core Strategy we assumed a continuing 1% annual growth in student numbers at Oxford Brookes.  This was the best available information at the time.  However, as a consequence of Government changes to the funding of higher education, it is anticipated that student numbers will actually fall a little in the near future.  Therefore the figures within the Council’s statement to the Core Strategy could now be argued to have overestimated future demand.

In summary, I am confident that we have a sound evidence base for estimating the number of future student units, but this is not an exact science and circumstances may continue to change as a result of factors outside the City Council’s control (e.g. the implications of changes in national policy).  We will continue to monitor student numbers through the Annual Monitoring Report and this will enable us to assess whether or not our existing planning policies are achieving the desired results.

(2)       Question to the Board Member, City Development (Councillor Colin Cook) from Sarah Milliken

            Sites and Housing DPD

“The Oxford City Committee of the CPRE requests clarification of what is meant by ‘public open space’ on new developments – whether this means unrestricted or restricted access open space – and whether these will be given protected open space designation in order to safeguard them from development in the future?”

Written response provided after the meeting as follows:

It is envisaged that access to the new areas of open space would be unrestricted (since they will be public rather than private open space). The precise details about how each area of open space is managed will, of course, need to be determined through discussions with the landowner/developer as part of the planning application process.

Whether or not these areas of open space on new developments are given protected open space status will be a matter for consideration when the relevant saved policies in the Local Plan are reviewed.  Clearly they cannot be designated on the Proposals Map until such time as the developments themselves are completed, since the location of the open space will be determined as part of the masterplanning of the relevant site. 

(3)       Question to the Board Member, Finance and Efficiency (Councillor Ed Turner) from James Rowland

“In December 2011 how many properties were Council Tax exempt due to being solely occupied by full time students (N category).  How does this compare with December 2010, 2008 and 2005?”

Written response provided after the meeting as follows:

Numbers of Category N exemptions - Council Tax as at:

Dec 10th 2011           2,339

Dec 11th 2010           2,589

Dec 13th 2008           2,387

Dec 10th 2005           1,845