Opponents of plans for Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs) turned up with placards to lobby councillors on their way into a planning meeting at the Town Hall.

The residents from Fant in Maidstone were concerned about two applications regarding HMOs in St Michael’s Road and in Bower Place.

They left the meeting two-and-a-half hours later, having seen one application approved and one refused.

The first application was to turn Grange Park, a former annex to the Grange Moor Hotel, into a 13-bed HMO, some with double rooms, accommodating up to 16 people.

A similar application, but for 14 beds, had previously been refused permission because it included a bedroom in the basement with no windows.

The latest application still has the kitchen in the basement with no windows, and a communal living area in the basement for which it was now proposed to insert two windows with a light well.

Unlike most HMO applications, there was sufficient parking - the hotel already had 18 spaces. The proposal reduces that to 16, with a bin store taking up the other two.

Planning officer Tony Ryan said the application was now acceptable and recommended approval, with a number of conditions - one of which was that even though there were 13 bedrooms, the use be restricted to eight households, which he said was necessary because some of the rooms had a shared lobby space and were not truly separate.

Two neighbours spoke against the plan, saying the small rooms and the subterranean communal area would not encourage residents to take a pride in their home.

They were also concerned it had not been specified what sort of waste bins would be provided. If they were the large communal bins, that could involve a waste lorry reversing down the driveway, which had not been considered.

One neighbour, Steve Baker, was concerned that a police recommendation that the rear car park have all-night lighting would “significantly degrade the amenity of my property.”

The three Fant ward councillors all spoke against the plan, but as visiting councillors they didn’t get a vote.

Cllr Paul Harper (Fant and Oakwood Ind) criticised the quality of the officer’s report, pointing to a lack of detail on the lighting and bins issue, and a lack of explanation on the eight-household condition.

He said: “This implies there will be families living in the house, which raises a whole safeguarding issue that has not been addressed.

He said: “At the very least, the application should be deferred for clarification and improvement.”

Cllr Patrick Coates (Fant and Oakwood Ind) said the plan was unworkable - there was no provision for fridges for the 13 households in the kitchen, which still had no windows.

And for 16 people, he felt the living accommodation was far too small.

Cllr Kimmy Milham (Green) agreed. She said: “There is a huge difference between staying in a hotel room for a night or two and living somewhere permanently.”

Because there was no room for a table in the rooms, she painted a sad picture of “People sitting on their little beds eating a Pot Noodle.”

She said: “We need a little less greed and a little more care.”

Committee members agreed that the standard of living accommodation was “minimal,” but said the size of the rooms did meet legal requirements.

Beyond an instruction that any lighting to the car park should be low-level and as unintrusive as possible, they approved the application with seven votes in favour, one against, and three abstentions.

The committee then considered an application for Nos 3 and 5 Bower Place.

The pair of linked cottages had been developed with matching extensions to form two six-bed HMOs.

Under current legislation, properties can be converted to a six-bed HMO without the need for planning permission, so that was not the issue at stake.

However, to achieve the conversion, the applicant, a Mr T. Salami, had raised the roof level to put in loft accommodation and introduced dormer windows, all without first gaining planning permission.

He had previously applied for a lawful development certificate for the roof changes which had been refused, and then refused again at appeal.

But he still went ahead with the work.

The planning officer, Rachel Elliott, insisted that councillors should only consider the roof alterations, and not the fact that the houses were now HMOs.

She thought the new roof was acceptable.

The public speakers disagreed.

Kelly Wissenden said the result was “hugely overbearing and “a massive eyesore”.

She also lamented the other aspects of the HMO conversion: the extra vehicles without any increase in parking, and the loss of green space through the building extensions.

Susan Manning, who lives behind the development, said: “It feels like a high-rise block towering over our garden.”

She was concerned that there was a view from the dormer windows not only into her garden, but also into her son’s bedroom.

Cllr Harper said the new roof was “dominating and out-of-scale with its neighbours”.

Cllr Coates described the endless development at the site as a “slap in the face” for residents and observed: “It seems this council is too scared to say no HMOs.”

Cllr Milham observed that because of the elevated position of the site, the raised roof affected people in four neighbouring roads not just the immediate neighbours.

This time the committee agreed with objectors.

Cllr Tony Harwood (Lib Dem) said: “It’s not a good design. It has a very deleterious effect on the street scene. We need to make a stand.”

Cllr Clive English (Lib Dem)) said: “It’s flipping awful.”

Rob Jarman, the council’s head of planning development, agreed that there were valid grounds for refusal, and observed that by going ahead with the construction, the applicant “had run the risk of enforcement action”.

There were eight votes for refusal, two against and two abstentions.

After the meeting, Cllr Paul Harper said: “The roof is a carbuncle on the landscape. Everybody was very pleased at the refusal.

“If I were one of the two tenants with a room in that roof space, I’d now be looking for somewhere else to live.”

But he described the committee’s decision to allow the Grange Park HMO as “bizarre”.

He said: “At the very least, the matter should have been deferred for a proper report.

“Fant residents went away very unhappy about that one.”