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NEWCASTLE EDITION October 2015
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CAN WE CARRY ON LIKE THIS? SOPHIA FRANKLIN
DOING HIS BIT: Beaming Northumbria University graduate Aidan Panagarry holds a small Syrian boy who has been displaced from his country. The former history student cut his holiday short to help refugees after witnessing the ‘shocking’ conditions in their camp read more p5
GREEDY developers looking to cash in on students could be building too many digs in Newcastle, a planning member has warned. Plans for about 11,000 new student homes have been approved since 2008, according to the Newcastle Chronicle. But if the current rate continues, they may stand empty, without enough students to fill them, Lib Dem councillor David Slesenger believes. He told TUP: ‘The amount of planning applications we’re getting for student accommodation is very substantial and I do wonder
whether there will be the number of students that might be provided for if all the successful applications are built. ‘But that’s up to the entrepreneurs and up to the students.’ His warning comes after Newcastle University submitted plans to replace the current 928-room building in Richardson Road with six ten-storey blocks, with capacity for more than 1,300 students. The new flats will each have eight en-suite bedrooms, with an open-plan kitchen/living room. There will also be an extension to the existing sports centre and a new home for the faculty of medical science, which was built in the late 1960s.
Elsewhere, Newcastle City Council has given the green light for the old Liquid nightclub building to be partially demolished to make way for a 329-bed student block. But as long as developers did not break the law, not much could be done to curb the influx of student housing applications, Cllr Slesenger added. He said: ‘It’s subject to planning law and the applicants are entitled to do what is in accord with planning law. ‘Lib Dems have always been in favour of student housing so far, as it gives students better opportunities – but it is the market that will decide how far it will go.’