Liberal Democrats celebrate win for longstanding campaign against HMO “wild west”

The fight to stop developers taking advantage of HMO rules has taken a step forward, with a date finally given to campaigners who have been working against the overdevelopment for years by Oldham Council.

The Liberal Democrats first put forward an Article 4 direction – a legal restriction on smaller HMOs, forcing them to require planning permission before they are delivered – to the Local Plan consultation in 2021, and have brought and backed a series of motions to deliver the measure in the four years since.

Shaw councillor and Oldham Liberal Democrat Leader Howard Sykes MBE said, “It has been blatantly obvious that we have needed an Article 4 direction in place for several years, and I am angry that it has taken this long for the Labour and their so-called Independent partners to deal with what is an absolute ‘wild west’.

“The Council agreed to investigate this in November 2023, but we have seen no progress in all that time. I’m delighted that finally the administration has finally seen fit to back the views of people from across the Borough and enact what the Liberal Democrats have been saying for years.”

There still remains significant outstanding problems with HMO licensing, with councillors being barred from knowing when applications for HMOs are submitted and blocked from being able to make representations on HMO licensing.

Councillor Sykes added, “We have a fundamentally broken planning system, and the rules around licensing are also failing people.  While I’m glad to see this step forward, we need to see a government that stops backing developers over residents.”