A group of York students has won the opportunity to have their very own I-phone application developed after winning The App Challenge final, held at the Ron Cooke Hub on Wednesday, January 18.
YUSU Welfare officer Bob Hughes has warned students to be vigilant after a student loans phishing scam has been revealed.
Her Majesty the Queen will be visiting York on Maundy Thursday, 5th April, as part of the 800th anniversary of York’s Charter for the traditional “Royal Maundy” ceremony.
A flood caused by a heating system “failure” forced the university IT services to shut down many essential systems on Sunday night, causing problems for many students on the eve of their exams and assignment due-dates.
The Article 4 direction, which was made on April 15, 2011 by the previous council, requires planning permission to convert a normal “dwelling house” to a “house in multiple occupation” in which tenants pay rent separately – typically students or low-income earners.
After “consideration of representations”, the council confirmed the directive on November 9. The direction doesn't apply over the whole of the Council Authority Area, but simply the “urban area” (pictured) in which current houses are situated, and will come into effect in April 2012.
Criticisms came primarily from students and landlords in the city, both of whom felt that the directive would unfairly affect them, with YUSU President Tim Ellis claiming that it would be “extremely damaging for our off-campus students who are likely to be forced further away from the university” and labelling the legislation “discriminatory”.
Ellis's predecessor, Tim Ngwena, made a similar comment in January, stating that “[problems] such as noise, litter and parking problems, will in no way be addressed by a Direction”.
Hull Road’s Councillors, Fiona Fitzpatrick and Neil Barnes, said that “the Hull Road area of York has seen an uncontrolled growth in HMOs – caused by a lack of accommodation to meet the demands of a growth in student numbers [but] we want to work towards a mixed community where students and long-term residents can live side by side in a safe and welcoming environment.”
Cllr Barnes, who was YUSU Academic and Welfare Officer in the academic year 2005-06, added: “I'm confident we are not being discriminatory towards students. This is an extra level of planning control to help all parties… It is not a draconian measure to stop all future HMO builds completely.”
Further criticisms came from Neill McTurk, Chairman of the York Residential Landlords Association, who claimed that “an Article Four will not enable the council to control the spread of HMO’s. It will stop entirely the provision of shared accommodation across York for young people and those on low incomes.”
Council Leader James Alexander, in an interview with The Yorker, responded by saying that it was “simply not true”, arguing that the measure would “aid in trying to have mixed communities” and “increase the quality of houses in multiple occupation”.
He also stated that key reasons for the directive was that he didn’t think “that students are getting a good deal from some of their landlords”, and that he thought the university “should be providing more [accommodation]”, saying that the Student Union had informed him that there “is more demand from second and third years to live on campus.”
Cllr Alexander, who was 2004-05 YUSU President, said that students get “picked on by some other residents” for untidy gardens and mismanaged bins and suggested that “the council could do more to inform those student tenants of when their bins should be collected, and I think the landlords should take more responsibility for those gardens and quite often, students get the blame for properties when they’re not even student properties at all.”
Cabinet member for Health, Housing and Adult Social Services, and Deputy Leader of the Labour Group, Councillor Tracy Simpson-Laing argued that landlords were not being detrimentally affected by the directive but that “it offers options that could help us ensure we get well managed HMOs in York and maintain balanced communities”, suggesting that it would “[protect] more family accommodation.”
Councillor Alexander also responded to criticisms that the council weren’t helping students by noting that he had “committed funding from the council towards a scheme to actually sell and celebrate the benefits that students bring to the city, economically as well as in volunteering terms.”
He also said that he “would like to the university build more campus accommodation and… also have a system of rent capping so that their rents are not so expensive” and that any students with comments could contact him with questions or concerns.
comment deleted by the author James Alexander needs to come down off his perch and actually speak to students. Is he so out of touch that he genuinely believes that the biggest problem for students are planning issues? It's not the layout of the building, time after time we hear that it is problems with the landlord management and there's nothing the planning system can do about that.
Mr. Alexander has clearly long forgotten his YUSU days as he chases the bigot vote over what's best for students, but how on earth can a move that will push up student rents in York be good for students? He may well have a point that more campus accommodation is necessary, but to try and do that by pushing up rents is shameless and shows he's more interested in cheap votes than the welfare of his community.
For a council who genuinely used the fact that students are more likely to be victims of crime as an excuse to limit the number of student houses available, thus pushing up rents, to somehow believe they are a champion of students is laughable.
Former YUSU lot slide up the greasy pole by any means necessary. Look forward to the various Tims arguing for students to be happy with their rubbish housing when they inevitably become councillors of some sort in the next 5 years
So it only affects the "urban area"? The red-lined bit in the image? Well that's not so...wait a minute, that "urban area" is...well, all the houses in York. I suppose students will be expected to live in tents on Wentworth Stray next year then.
Still, we should be thankful this only prevents new houses. In Nottingham their council has passed an article (coincidentally also an Article 4) which actively allows them to displace students and to move them away from residential areas and into housing blocks...
Just to clarify: the urban area has the article 4 direction, but the direction simply allows restrictions to occur - if the planning committee wanted to allow housing to become an HMO on Windmill Lane or Heslington Road it would still have that power - but it would be more likely to block either of those than a proposal in Acomb.
And, as another clarification: James Alexander, in his interview, was also keen on explaining that they've got a scheme in place to make sure that student housing gets up to standard, and that I neglected to include that because I wanted the article to have some sort of flow (and not go on forever).
And on another note, around 20-30% of student housing doesn't get filled each year, with many of the 'more expensive' houses being signed in the autumn term. House prices are high because students pay that rate; there are cheaper options available if people wait until March.. though university accommodation would help. And remember that student numbers are going to go down (on average) over the coming years.
I'm not arguing in favour - but a couple of the above comments are a bit harsh and I feel that's partly because of the way I phrased the article! I'll link James Alexander to this story too so that he can defend himself, and you can ask questions directly in the comments if you want 
Afraid he won't be able to, the Yorker registration system is broken :(
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