AN INDEPENDENT review into how controversial student housing blocks won planning permission could be launched.

Oxford West and Abingdon MP Nicola Blackwood warned that with every new revelation about the Castle Mill accommodation “the picture just seems to get worse”.

Campaigners claim the blocks were built on contaminated land, with Oxford University ignoring orders for a safety survey until work was well under way. The allegations will be at the centre of a legal challenge against planning permission for the 312 student rooms in Roger Dudman Way.

With evidence suggesting “hotspots of elevated metals and hydrocarbons both in the soils and groundwater” on the former railway sidings site, the Environment Agency said that without a contamination survey, construction of the development would pose “an unacceptable risk”.

But campaigners claim the university failed to carry out the survey ordered by Oxford City Council until after work was well under way.

And they have criticised the council for failing to enforce its will, through a “casual approach” to planning and ”unhealthily close link with the university”.

When the university eventually did carry out an asessment – in March – city officers rejected it as inadequate.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England, which has lodged an application for a judicial review with the High Court, says that in addition to “environmental vandalism”, serious issues about public health and risk assessment need to be examined.

Helen Marshall, director of CPRE Oxfordshire, said: “A planning condition put in place to protect human and environmental health has been ignored. It is appalling.

“It appears the actual risk assessment was not received until the end of March, over six months after the beginning of building work.

“We are shocked that determining whether the site is safe is taking place retrospectively.”

Miss Blackwood said: “We are reaching the point where an independent review of the decision may be the only way we will get to the bottom of it.”

Oxford University spokesman Matt Pickles said: “We do not think it is appropriate to respond in the press while legal proceedings are active.”

City council spokesman Louisa Dean said: “The council is not prepared to conduct litigation through the press. CPRE Oxfordshire has issued proceedings in the High Court and the council will properly respond to those proceedings.”