A CITY council error has forced views on multiple occupancy properties to be sought for the second time.

Worcester City Council says a possible mistake appeared in its online consultation which has meant they plan to re-run the public consultation on whether homes in the city should be converted to multiple occupancy.

The error is thought to relate to a question which gave three options; yes, no or don't know, with those choosing 'yes' but adding a comment possibly being placed in the 'don't know' option.

The council will be contacting all previous respondents who supplied their contact details.

“I want to apologise to everyone who completed the original consultation online for the inconvenience that this re-run will cause," said David Blake, service manager for Regeneration and Business Engagement.

"Unfortunately we discovered a possible technical issue which meant the results of the previous consultation may have been unreliable.

"We felt the only fair course of action was to re-run the entire consultation.

“This does, of course, give a further opportunity for the people of Worcester to make their views known on this important subject.”

The consultation, which can be found at worcester.gov.uk/voiceit and at city libraries, will run until Monday, May 12.

The consultation concerns Houses of Multiple Occupancy (HMO), which are homes rented out to several tenants, such as young professionals or students.

The city council last year agreed to make it a requirement for landlords to seek planning permission to convert a normal home into an HMO containing between three and six beds.

City councillors subsequently backed proposals that a property could only be converted into an HMO if, within a 100-metre radius, no more than ten per cent of housing is already classed as HMOs.