At its meeting on 16 October 2018, the City Executive Board will be asked to approve the Oxford Local Plan 2036 proposed submission draft for public consultation.

This is an opportunity for the Housing Panel to make recommendations to the Board beforehand. The Scrutiny Committee will consider the local plan on 8 October 2018.

In addition to the Local Plan and its appendices (which are included in this agenda), there are also several supplementary documents to be approved by Council in parallel with the Local Plan. These are not central to the Panel’s consideration, but can be accessed as part of the Scrutiny Committee papers here. The additional documents are in excess of 500 pages.

Councillor Hollingsworth, Board Member for Planning and Transport, explained that the Local Plan had been to the Scrutiny Committee on 8 October 2018, following three years of development and consultation, and would subsequently be going to the City Executive Board and Full Council on 16 and 17 October respectively. The Plan would then go out for public consultation specifically for comments on its soundness, which would then be considered by a Planning Inspector. The final Plan needed to be submitted no later than 31 March 2019. This would be the overarching document that planning applications would be judged against up until 2036.

Councillor Hollingsworth highlighted that one area of contention concerned the difference between housing need and supply. The recent Central Government methodology for calculating unmet need was considered less appropriate than the former methodology, given that it relied on household formation figures, and that households were not forming in Oxford due to the significant unaffordability of housing. The Council was basing its calculations for need on the evidence based used for the Oxfordshire Housing and Growth Deal, and social housing need calculated as part of the Strategic Housing Market Assessment.

The Chair welcomed Fran Ryan and Diana Musgrave to address the Panel. They raised the following issues for the Panel’s consideration in relation to Policy H7 (Community Led Housing and Self-build Housing):

1.    They were pleased to see in policy H7 that Proposals for community-led housing would be supported. They asked that the phrase ‘permanent affordability’ be added to the list of benefits identified from community-led housing.

2.    They asked that the policy specify some of the ways in which support would be given:

·         Flexibility of tenure type (for example, to promote community cohesion, Oxford Cohousing favoured a third social rented, a third shared ownership, and a third market housing).

·         Flexibility on the balance of dwellings (for example, Oxford Cohousing plans to have shared guest rooms, which encouraged individual households to have fewer bedrooms)

3.    Concern that Policy H7 combines community-led housing with self-build in a way that could be confusing. Specifically, some community-led housing was also collective self-build, but most was not. When Oxford’s community-led housing groups include collective self-build, the purpose is to increase the affordability of homes in the scheme. By contrast, single-plot self-build is generally a matter of individuals building for their own benefit. They proposed splitting Policy H7 into H7a covering community-led housing and H7b on self-build. They provided the meeting with draft wording for how this could be done.

4.    They welcomed the provision of space for self-build on larger sites, and asked that a mechanism to makes provision for community-led housing also be included in the Local Plan.

Councillor Hollingsworth responded to their comments. He explained that permanent affordability could not be made a condition on planning applications, and must be non-binding. Officers advised that in the long term, having such a provision may weaken the Council’s position in relation to securing 50% affordable housing, 80% of which would be permanent social rented. It was also explained that including flexibility of tenure type and balance of dwellings had the possibility of undermining the Council’s social housing policy position.

It was highlighted that there could always be exceptions to the policy which would need to be judged on their merits, but it was not appropriate to list exceptions as this would open the Council up to challenge. In response to questions, it was clarified that the Council’s wholly-owned Housing Company would need to comply with the standards set out in the Local Plan.

Councillor Hollingsworth agreed to add in reference to permanent affordability, on the understanding that the inspector may ask that it be removed, and that it would not have any material effect on the acceptance of planning applications. He also agreed that sub-headings could be inserted into the Local Plan to separate community-led housing and self-build housing; however the policy numbering would not change as suggested by the visiting speakers. The following wording suggested by the visiting speakers was also agreed to be included in policy H7: “Proposals for self-build housing will be supported as a way of enabling people to meet their own housing needs, particularly community-led collective self-build.”

Frances Evans, Housing Strategy and Service Development Manager, explained that the Council had recently undertaken to research community-led housing options in greater detail, and a report could be brought forward to councillors on the findings of that work later in the year.

The Chair asked how the scale of housing delivery over the plan period compared to recent years, and how the projections of an average ~400 dwellings each year were arrived at. It was explained that a thorough assessment of all available sites in Oxford had been undertaken, which included assessments relating to the availability, achievability and suitability of sites. This process involved contacting land owners within the City, and asking whether they would make their land available for development. This also involved desktop research and undertaking various studies concerning the constraints of sites such as flooding potential and density numbers.

Councilor Hollingsworth added that ~400 homes were achieved prior to the 2009 recession, and since then the Council has not reached its target. However, averaged out since before the recession to the present day, nearly 400 homes each year had been achieved.

The Chair also asked how windfalls were calculated, given that they account for 1020 homes over the Plan period. Amanda Ford, Planning Policy Team Leader, explained that consideration was given to the number of windfall sites since 2006, which allowed for approximately 60 dwellings each year on average. This figure had then been multiplied over the plan period to account for the forecasted 1020 windfall homes.

The Chair asked in what circumstances employment-liked homes would be given car-free development status. Amanda Ford explained that it would depend on the location of the site, but the intention was for sites to be car free where possible. Issues such as shop accessibility, the enforcement of Controlled Parking Zones (CPZ) and transport links would also be an important factor. CPZs would need to be in place before a development commences, and car free restrictions could not be imposed retrospectively after planning permission had been approved.

Any employers looking to develop housing would need to justify why they needed parking spaces, for example, social care workers who require frequent car use. It was clarified that the Plan placed requirements on developers to provide mechanisms for ensuring that developments remain car free.

A discussion also took place concerning the sites already identified for employment-linked housing. It was expected that more sites would come forward over the plan period.