A mum says she is being driven out of her Victorian four-bedroom home after the controversial approval of a plan to turn the next-door property into a house of multiple occupation (HMO). Hayley Trotter, 45, broke down in tears in front Salford planning committee councillors as she pleaded with them to refuse an application to convert the vacant house next to hers into a six-bed HMO. Following a long debate, the 10 councillors were split evenly, but chair Councillor Phil Cusack had the casting vote and opted in favour of the application for the conversion of the property on Peel Green Road, Eccles. Mother-of-two Ms Trotter sobbed as she told the meeting: “This is having a massive affect on my family. It’s causing a lot of stress and upset over who’s going to be living next door. “We’ve got lovely neighbours, but now I’m going to be worried about the noise coming from next door.” She told the committee that when previous owner of the house lived there, the walls were so thin she could hear him drawing the curtains. Ms Trotter also said her partner was an HGV driver and feared he would kept awake by ‘disturbances’ from next, rendering him potentially unsafe to drive his huge truck. After the meeting she vowed to put her house up for sale. “I’ve already had it valued,” she said. Another close neighbour, Katherine Morgan, 48, also addressed the meeting. She blasted a report presented to the committee by the city’s planning officers. “I’m surprised by what’s there [in the report], given my experience of living in the area,” she said. “It is written with the result of ‘approval’ in mind and isn’t balanced, as if it’s a foregone conclusion.” She described the findings of highways officers as ‘unrecognisable to us local residents’. “Parking is tight here and this proposal will make matters worse,” she said. “The planning department don’t demonstrate a need for this type of development, and that should be a matter of policy for you. We cannot have HMOs imposed willy-nilly.” The objecting residents were backed by Higher Irlam and Peel Green ward councillor John Walsh. He alluded to comments made by an agent for the applicant that the residents of the HMO would be ‘professional’ and there would be a cycle storage facility and it would be unlikely they would have cars. Councillor Walsh said: “There’s some real assumptions there – one, that only professionals are going to live there and, two, that they are going to cycle. “It could be that there’s six people living there and they could all have cars, so unless they’re going to bar people who’ve got a car, or who are not professionals, they can’t sustain what they are saying. “It’s completely out of character with the area, from a planning viewpoint. It’s a residential home in a residential area which is well used and where there is a very good community spirit. “To say what the traffic people say that there’s no issues there is wrong. When I was first elected to that ward, I went down Peel Green Road and just on one corner everyone said the thing we need to do is stop the speeding traffic because my car’s been damaged. “What we need to do is look at the records of what’s happened there. People’s wing mirrors have been broken and people are speeding down there.” He said there would be a loss of amenity in the area, because’ this is totally out of character’, which, he argued is another planning consideration. He added: “I’ve spoken to the residents and they’re not against development in that area. But they are opposed to this particular development. They are not NIMBYs [not in my back yard]. The present application is completely out of order. It will change the nature of the area.” However, Councillor Mike McCusker argued that the city council was in a ‘a Catch 22 situation’. “A search of the census shows 62 per cent of residents who live in HMOs don’t own cars, which means that, statistically, as an HMO only one person here would own a car. If this stays as a residents property, potentially there could be four cars there. “On the subject of who will be living there, there are a lot of assumptions about people living in HMOs, but that’s not material to us [in planning law terms]. “The council does take its responsibilities seriously. This is a compliant application.” The committee approved restrictions to the property, limiting the number of people who could live there to six and asked the applicant to review the waste bin area and make it larger. But before it went the vote, Councillor Bob Clarke said: “What I can’t get over is, yet again, another family home being turned into bed-sit land between two residential properties, in a well established community of families. “I can’t imagine living nextdoor to people using six en suites 24 hours a day, it would drive me nuts. You’ve got to worry about people’s mental health, and their quality of life and their peace and quiet. “This is not a solution to the housing problem. It’s going to create another problem when we haven’t got enough four-bedroomed family homes. “They keep on building thousands of apartments in Manchester and turning perfectly good homes into HMOs and destroying people’s lives, so I won’t be supporting this.” Councillor Karen Garrido agreed with him, saying: “The parking is tight. Anyone who goes down Peel Green Road knows that. All we’re doing is saying ‘that’s fine’ if you’ve got six cars or four cars’ go and park outside someone else’s house. But that’s not right either.” But Councillor Jane Hamilton said: “We are in a difficult situation, between a rock and hard place. If we turn it down and it goes to appeal is going to cost the council money [on appeal]. We’ve got to come up with a [viable] reason for rejection. When the vote was taken the split was 5-5, but chair Councillor Phil Cusack voted in favour of the conversion. He said: “I feel there is an over-riding need [for housing accommodation]. If we look at the housing density policy requirements I’m fairly convinced if this went to appeal it would be overturned immediately by the planning inspector.”
