The Cornwall councillor responsible for housing has said there is no attempt to give preferential treatment to planning applications for homes of multiple occupation for “young professionals”.

A question on whether a two-tier system for such developments was being created was posed to Olly Monk at a planning committee meeting today.

Cornwall Council’s central planning committee was considering an application from Dirk Parker to turn the former Golant Hotel in Newquay into a house of multiple occupation (HMO). The application was to change the property in Mount Wise into a nine-bedroom HMO.

Comments from both Cllr Monk and Newquay Town Council suggested that one of the benefits of the scheme was that it would be marketed to “young professionals”.

Cllr Monk said in his submission: “I believe the application demonstrates a shift away from what we would consider a typical HMO and will provide quality accommodation for young professional people.”

This led to committee member John Fitter asking whether this was suggesting that there could be a two-tier approach to HMOs.

Cllr Fitter said that Cllr Monk, as Cabinet member for housing, should be seeking to provide “housing for all regardless of class or colour”.

He said: “We shouldn’t be judging HMOs whether they are for young professionals or people from the north coming here to do road sweeping.”

Cllr Fitter said he was concerned that the comments from Cllr Monk and the town council suggested that applications for HMOs for “professionals” would be treated more favourably than those for people who are genuinely homeless and on benefits.

Cllr Monk, who is Cornwall councillor for the area where the application site is located, dismissed the concerns.

He said that the council could only consider applications based on the information supplied and on planning grounds. He added: “You can’t differentiate between the two, you can only take it on face value.”

And he added: “There isn’t a two tier system, obviously you always want to attract people into accommodation who are responsible and will look after the place and that is the assurance we have had from the landlord.”

Planning officers had recommended that the application should be refused because it would be against a policy in the Newquay Neighbourhood Development Plan (NDP) which states that residential areas in the town should have no more than 5% of properties as HMOs.

It was revealed that Mount Wise currently has more than 10% of properties as HMOs. However, Newquay Town Council and Cllr Monk, who both supported the NDP said they backed the application because it would help the housing crisis in the town.

They said that it would be reasonable to break the planning policy on this occasion as they did not consider Mount Wise to be residential.

Town councillor Joanna Kenny said that a large number of the properties in the area were commercial and that additional HMOs would help the town rather than hinder it.

Cllr Fitter said that he was concerned that if the council were to breach the NDP, which had been agreed and accepted by local residents, then it might undermine the planning policies.

He said: “This policy isn’t open for us to be able to take a different view on it as it is a clear policy. I have to say as a committee that where we have clear policies in a neighbourhood development plan, I do not treat it like an a la carte menu and pick and choose which bits I like and don’t like, we have to consider them as set out.

“This is a clear policy written by the people who brought this policy in, the only way they can change that is to change the policy through amending the development plan.”

However Councillor Sally Anne Weedon said: “There seems to be so much support for this application and it hinges on a dodgy policy in the neighbourhood development plan. It (the HMO) seems really needed with the housing crisis.”

Other councillors agreed and said that it was more important to help provide housing for local people through the provision of HMOs.

The committee agreed to grant planning permission to change the use of the property to an HMO with nine votes in favour and two against.