THE OXFORD PAPER Thursday, February 1, 2018 No.77
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Adult care hit as hospice announces house to Restored 1980s Cortina Retiring leader shares his close and jobs to go Page 7 Page 5 helps charity Page 18 highs & lows
Weekly leisure guide for in & around Oxford
Your guide for your
Out& About Pu leisure time in & aroun
d Oxfordshire
t the date in your diary...
Comedy marathon – 5 venues in 1 day and all for a good cause
Gary Ba rlow and Tim Firt Calendar h’s Girls at the N ew Theatre
Homeless strategy adopted as rough sleepers increase By Owen Hughes
that will investigate how damage to DNA is repaired with a view to potentially improve cancer treatment and survival rates. World Cancer Day takes place annually on February 4.
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Prof Opher Gileadi, have been awarded the funding by Cancer Research UK in the run up to World Cancer Day on Sunday. The scientists in Oxford will use the funds for a five-year project
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THREE leading scientists are all smiles in their lab after winning a £1.6million grant to carry out vital research. Professors Peter McHugh and Chris Schofield together with
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Getting to grips with DNA to fight cancer
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ROUGH sleeping in Oxford is at an all time high as the city council receives cross party support for the adoption of a new three-year strategy to reduce homelessness. A head count of 61 people rough sleeping in the city centre last year is almost double that recorded in 2016 when 33 were counted. At a meeting on Monday the council voted in favour of adopting the Housing and Homeless Strategy 2018-21 recommended after six weeks of public consultation. Plans include delivering affordable housing, bringing empty homes back into use, and partnering with volunteer and support groups. Councillor Mike Rowley, board member for housing, said: “The latest street count figures show the devastating impact of the housing crisis and the government’s austerity measures on the streets of our city. “We want to ensure that nobody has to sleep rough on the streets of Oxford.” He added that the council’s support for the strategy shows that they are “determined to tackle homelessness in Oxfordshire”. But Conor McKenzie, Liberal Democrat candidate for Carfax, said Labour on Oxford City Council “is all talk and no action” and their strategy is “little more than aspiration, backed
up by very few actual commitments”. The government Rough Sleeping Statistics England Autumn 2017 show a 15 per cent increase nationally and a 24 per cent increase in the South East but an 85 per cent in Oxford on the previous year. Mr McKenzie said: “The city council have a lot to answer for. “They have consistently tried to shift the blame on this matter, but what we can see is Oxford is far, far worse than the national and regional averages.” On the adopted strategy, Mr McKenzie said: “ ‘No second night out’ is a good model but it isn’t backed up by nearly enough resources, and neither the city council’s budget or even the strategy commits to them. “We have seen next to no advances in affordable house-building over the past five years here in Oxford, and going forward the Oxpens and Barton sites haven’t actually come with clear commitments to nearly enough affordable homes.” He added the Liberal Democrats are pushing for more funding for homeless support, would scrap “Labour’s punitive measures such as fi nes and removing sleeping bags”, and build more affordable housing. Oxford City Council was the fi rst in the county to be awarded a Gold Standard by a national homelessness prevention service in August last year.
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