A new centre for homeless people in the centre of Truro has been granted planning permission.

Cornwall Council had applied for permission to convert Chough House in River Street in the city centre into a new Safe Place to Stay facility.

It is hoped that the centre could be the first of a series which could be opened across Cornwall to help provide somewhere safe for rough sleepers to stay.

Cornwall Council said that the new centre would be used as a permanent replacement for the temporary accommodation pods – known as Carrick Cabins – which were installed last year to help take rough sleepers off the street.

The plans were given unanimous backing by the council’s central sub-area planning committee with councillors saying they hope to see more opened.

Work will be carried out to convert the redundant office building so that it will have nine self-contained bedrooms with en-suite facilities along with two emergency rooms.

There will also be offices, staff areas and interview rooms while an air source heat system and solar panels will also be installed.

Sam Irving, head of delivery and development at Cornwall Council, said that the Safe Place to Stay facility would help the city.

He said: “Truro is one of Cornwall’s hotspots in terms of rough sleepers, sadly during the pandemic that need has grown and the council is providing significantly more people with temporary accommodation than this time last year.”

Turning to the recent provision he said: “The council and partners worked hard to provide additional emergency housing for people who might otherwise be on the streets and at increased risk of contracting Covid-19.

“These schemes have been highly successful, no more so than what has become known as the Carrick Cabins space that provides 11 emergency accommodation pods. The site has been praised by support organisations, the media, police and the residents themselves.

“Provision of such accommodation has proved to be game changing, we have been able to properly engage with rough sleepers, providing them with safe, warm and dry accommodation and put them on a path to settled housing.

“However, schemes like Carrick Cabins are only temporary, we need a range of permanent arrangements which is why I am presenting Chough House to you today which we hope will be the first of a programme of permanent schemes to provide specific, high quality accommodation to help bring permanently an end the need for anyone to sleep rough in Cornwall.”

Mr Irving said that  work to adapt the property would start in April so that it would be open for winter 2021.

He said that the centre would have staff and security on site at all times and said that while local businesses had raised concerns he said that these had been addressed with the security arrangements which had been put in place.

A condition was placed on the planning consent to ensure that the centre will be properly managed at all times.

The planning committee gave unanimous approval to the plans.