Community Questions for Royal Holloway

1. Do you think that it is socially responsible for RHUL to grow its student numbers and increase its campus size whilst at the same time making no contributions to the Community Infrastructure Levy (student accommodation is currently £0).
2. With regard to the George Eliot Halls development, do you think it was socially responsible for RHUL to lobby the Planning Inspector to overturn RBC’s decision, and after it was upheld at appeal, especially when the local community strongly opposed it?
3. With regard to George Eliott Halls, do you think it is responsible to provide no parking spaces for the residents that live in these Halls?
4. Did you engage with the Englefield Green Forum when they were developing its Neighbourhood Plan? How many times did you meet them during the 3/ 4 year process? What did you add to the discussions?
5. What involvement did RHUL have in getting the line, This Neighbourhood Plan…‘recognises the strategic importance of the campus and the ongoing need for growth’ included in the Englefield Green Neighbourhood Plan?
6. RHUL’s Masterplan was given planning approval in principle so long as the interests of the residents would be balanced with those of the university. What specific steps has RHUL taken to ensure that the interests of the residents living in the communities of Egham and Englefield Green have been balanced against the interests of RHUL as the university has expanded?
7. You have an aspiration to grow your student numbers from 12,000 to 15,000 students by 2030. When you last sought growth to 12,000, you consulted with the local community. Do you think you should have discussed this 25% increase with the local community on this occasion?
8. Do you think a local resident to student ratio of approximately 2:1 is appropriate for a healthy and balanced community? (26,000 local residents, 15,000 students.)
9. You have decided not to pursue the Rusham Park Student Village for the time being. Where are you planning on accommodating the increasing number of students?
10. You closed your Kingswood Hall this year and we are unaware of any provision to replace this accommodation. Can you please confirm that these halls are going to be reopened? If so, when do you expect this to happen? Students have complained to WNTT about the amount of accommodation that is available to them. Can you please advise as to the total amount of RHUL owned beds spaces available for each of the last 5 years?
11. What is your policy for 2nd & 3rd year students regarding their accommodation needs?
12. With a shortage of housing up and down the land, do you think that the Rusham Park site should be considered for local housing if you do not plan to use it in the near future? When do you think you will know what you will be doing with this site, if you indeed plan to keep it? Do you support the need for an Article 4 Direction to protect the area from turning into a student village in all bar name?
13. Densities of HMOs in the local community are at an all time high. The majority of students have aspirations of living in the local community as part of their student experience. Do you have any evidence to suggest that this aspiration is changing?
14. High densities of HMOs have recognised negative impacts on a local community. Do you think it is responsible for you to increase your student numbers in the full knowledge that this will exacerbate these impacts including those on the local school?
15. I live in Englefield Green East. Please see graph below. Do you think that the graph should be cause for concern?

I do. All other groups, with the exception of 18-23, have gone down.  This will impact the likes of local businesses and sports clubs, as the largest demographic is absent for a third/ half of the year.

If you look at the total Englefield Green East population, you can see that without the 18-23 age group that the rest of the population has more than halved since 2001.

Total population with 18-23 age group: 2001 = 5724, 2011 = 5427, 2021 = 5504.

Total population without 18-23 age group: 2001 = 5070, 2011= 2858, 2021 = 2453.

What socio-economic impacts do you think this has on my community?

16. You explained at your RH2030 presentation that distance learning was something that you were keen to explore for a number of reasons. What evidence does the university have that future students would prefer distance learning rather than attending the campus in person full-time?
17. You argue that the university brings a boost to the local economy. We believe the main beneficiary are landlords, their agents and shareholders of private purpose built accommodation. In fact, we believe that as the majority of students are absent for approximately 50% of the year and that the community is in fact disadvantaged. Most local residents don’t benefit from the university’s presence, and that includes the majority of local businesses. However one group of students has provided a gain for local businesses: international students. Your world wide ranking though over the last 13 years has slipped from 88th in the world to somewhere between 351-400. Subsequently China will no longer sponsor their nationals to study at RHUL as their policy requires universities to be in the top 200. Have you any plans to address this issue?

18. A normal business when it outgrows their site often seeks to relocate part of or all of its business. Do you think that you have outgrown your site? Do you have any plans to develop a new campus?
19. You have been in conversations with Slough Borough Council about a possible partnership. Is this correct? Could you expand here on your conversations? Are you planning on building a campus there?
20. There are approximately 727 student HMOs in Egham & Englefield Green. RBC recently wrote a report listing the impacts that high densities of student HMOs can have on a community. To recap these include:

• Increase in population densities resulting in increases in domestic refuse, litter (e.g. fast food and pizza boxes) and fly-tipping of unwanted household items (e.g. discarded beds/mattresses, sofas and fridges);
• The removal of hedges, fences, gates, and gardens for driveways;
• The proliferation of ‘to-let’ boards, unkempt gardens and yards;
• Dilapidated external residential facades and the disrepair of housing (depending on the landlord);
• The exclusion of local families and low-income individuals and households from the local housing market;
• The replacement / displacement of local families by transient student populations;
• The marginalisation and polarisation of local families;
• The gradual closure of local crèches, nurseries and schools, and other community facilities;
• The loss of family-oriented public and private services;
• Higher levels of burglary and crime;
• The formation of a new sense of place, and a different type of ambience in the neighbourhood;
• Room arrangements and a lifestyle which can exacerbate noise nuisance (e.g. parties, higher occupancy levels in HMO);
• The conflicts between the everyday living routines (e.g. timing of work, play and sleep) of established residents and many students;
• Increased car parking and congestion.

Knowing these impacts, do you think that it was socially responsible of you to explore a head lease scheme to underwrite landlords’ risk when the Renter’s Reform Bill was a concern of yours?

21. Can you please confirm the number of buildings that make up your London campus? Can you advise the site’s total sq footage? Can you advise on the number of Lecture Halls? Can you advise on the number of Seminar Rooms? Can you advise whether you have a Hall Of Rsidence/s in London? Can you confirm if you have any other PBSA in London? Can you advise as to the number of students that regularly attend the London campus? Can you advise as to the split between undergraduate and postgraduate students that attend that campus? Are you planning on purchasing/ building any more assets on your London campus? Nick Barratt recently alluded to BBC Surrey that you plan to accommodate some of the 25% growth at the London campus. Can you advise as to the number of students you plan to teach there in 2030?
22. Can you please tell me what percentage of RHUL accommodation unlet in the George Eliot development? I can understand that many students want to let HMOs in the community but this does have an effect on parking spaces. Students do not appear to be monitored in this respect by RHUL. What steps are you taking to lessen this problem?
23. Do you think that it is time to host your Freshers’ & Leavers’ Balls to another venue? Do you think it is responsible to host an outdoor event of this scale in such a built up area? Do you not think that noise nuisance that these events create each year (including ball goers returning home) could perhaps be considered as anti-social?
24. Anecdotally, ASB and Noise seem to spike on Wednesday evenings/ Thursday mornings. Transient Noise that you claim is difficult to manage also seems to spike then too. Do you think that this is associated with the sports clubs often having events on Wednesday night?
25. Some universities have a 24hr emergency number that local residents can call in order for ASB/ Noise to be dealt with. Why have you pushed back on providing this type of service? Do you think RBC and Surrey Police should be paying to manage RHUL students in the community?
26. The Spring Rise Gate is closed in the evening to discourage Student Union members and their guests from using it late at night in an attempt to mitigate night time noise for residents that live in this area. Students have advised us that this gate is often breached by students and often vandalised so that it cannot be closed. Is this the case? How much money in the last 5 years have you spent fixing this gate? Do you think an alternate provision should be sought that is more effective?
27. What is your current car parking capacity on your main campus? What was it in 2004 and what was in 2014? Do you think you have increased your provision sufficiently to accommodate your growth over the last 20 years?
28. You host Undergraduate Open Days. These events are ticketed but inevitably prospective students and their parents will arrive without tickets. Do you have a procedure for turning away guests that do not have tickets?
29. On June 8th 2024, Egham Hill was gridlocked for most of the day. Local residents witnessed cars queuing to get onto your campus from both directions: traffic management was non-existent. The car parks reached capacity and cars with frustrated prospective students and their parents doing circuits of the campus leaving the campus before re-entering it. How will you ensure that this chaos will not happen again?
30. Why did you arrange your undergraduate open day on the same day as the halls moving out day?
31. You advise your students to leave their cars at home. Why do you think they will listen to you when there is no legal requirement for them to do so? What consequences do you instil on students that do not uphold your guidance?
32. Do you think that the restrictions on parking on campus (those living closer than 1.5 miles being exempt from applying for a permit for example) lead to many students choosing to use the streets around the campus to park instead? Do you think this is responsible? Do you think local residents should pay for a solution to a problem that you have caused?
33. At the RHRCG meeting on 13th June 2023 Mike Berry claimed that the Omnidrone facility was complete and physically ‘very discrete’. Now that the trees adjacent to the A30 and Piggery Gate have been cut down, does the university still maintain that the hanger is ‘very discrete’?

34. How many parking spaces were lost through these two developments?
35. When are you going to start using the new Piggery Gate?
36. The RHRCG Meetings are considered by many that attend them as unfit for purpose. How are you going to restore faith in them?
37. You stopped hosting meeting for local residents in 2015. Would you consider hosting an improved RHRCG formatted meeting in public? If not, why not?
38. RBC asked you to attend its Overview & Scrutiny Committee meeting last year. You declined and chose to submit a written statement. Do you think this constitutes working closely with RBC?
39. In a recent BBC Surrey interview, Nick Barratt went on the record as saying up to 40% of students choose to live at home and commute to campus. Was he referring to the Egham campus? Can you please provide the evidence that backs up this statement. And can you please define what constitutes the term ‘commute from home’ as RHUL sees it.
40. Nick Barratt also highlighted in the same BBC Surrey interview that only one person from the community had requested a ‘drop in meeting’ with RHUL in the past year. Do you believe that this KPI means that the community is happy with the impact that your organisation is having on the community? Or do you think you should be asking yourself some other questions?
41. Why does RHUL’s approach to community engagement consist of: deliberate obfuscation, containment, public relations, – rather than genuinely engaging constructively? Remember, ‘To Be, Rather Than To Seem.’

Reporting

42. You regularly cite that reports of ASB are down. Do you think that you should fix the term that the figures are looked at? Most businesses look at like-for-like with the previous year. This would be helpful to understand an accurate picture. Choosing varying periods often can be used to hide trends.
43. Do you think that ASB reports reflect reality? Do you think that the reporting procedure that RHUL, Surrey Police and RBC is straightforward and easy to use? Do you think that the victims of ASB have confidence that reporting will provide them a resolution and that they report that a resolution will take place?
44. Do you think that ASB incidents should be collated as cases? Do you think that cases should span periods of longer than a day? Do you think that this type of data management leads to the actual picture being painted being somewhat opaque?
45. It is reported that some residents that report regularly have their data removed from the statistics? Can you confirm or deny that this has happened in the past? Does it continue to happen today?
46. Some student households continue their anti-social behaviour after intervention. These households can cause misery to their neighbours. How effective do you think your interventions are with ‘repeat offender’ households? Do you think responses from you along the lines of, ‘we will continue to monitor the situation’ extinguishes the ASB problem? Do you think this is effective management of repeat offender ASB households?
47. At what point in your monitoring do you instigate disciplinary proceedings through your minor conduct policy? How many times have you used your minor misconduct policy in the last academic year? What penalties are sanctioned when the disciplinary panel conclude that a student HMO’s behaviour has tarnished the reputation of the university?
48. RHUL, Surrey Police and RBC have a MOU. How often do you meet to disseminate the data, identify new ASB hotspots and devise strategies to tackle these ongoing issues?
49. If it was agreed that a new central point of reporting was to be adopted over the current reporting guidelines would you support it? And would you help promote it to the local community?
50. Prof. Tracy Bhamra advised that RHUL’s 2023 ‘Be A Good Neighbour’ campaign was a great success gaining 12,000 views in just over a month. (7th Sept-11th Oct.) This was a marked improvement on last year’s campaign that attracted c.50 views over the whole year. Was it mandatory for all students to watch the new 2023 video? If not, how did you get so many views? What was the amount of views between the period 11th Oct-8th June?
51. This summer a student was attacked on campus. Do you think that a lack of intervention to mitigate your impact as your university grows in any way affects the safety of your students as local resentment grows?
52. Both estate agents and students report that there is a chronic shortage of student HMOs to rent in the local community. Do you think that by not providing enough of your own accommodation has led to this scenario? Did you know that Egham is now the third most profitable place to be a landlord in the UK? Do you think that it is fair that your students are paying overinflated prices by putting so many students on one campus and not supplying them with enough accommodation?
53. Nick Barratt, in a recent BBC Surrey interview, advised that RHUL students donated 11,000 hours of time volunteering. Do you view volunteering (and indeed music recitals) like carbon offsetting? Many local residents view you conflating the issues associated with your growth and volunteering as a greenwashing type exercise. Do you understand the cynicism?
54. Many local residents were happy to hear that Paul Layzell was stepping down as during his tenure his growth strategy cared little for the local community. Do you think that the Senior Management Team retains Paul’s philosophy today?
55. Do you really think that you take ‘being a good neighbour’ seriously or is your slogan just marketing? Similarly, what should the local community make of the slogan, ‘Our relationship with our wider community is important to us.’
56. Does the university have a policy on Corporate Social Responsibility and, if so, what does it say about the university’s responsibility towards the immediate community that hosts it?