AN EMPTY tattoo parlour in Blackbird Leys is set to become a community support centre for people with drug and alcohol abuse problems.

The Knights Road unit has laid empty for two years after the tattoo shop fell into financial problems.

But national charity Lifeline Project wants to transform it into a community hub for the estate, supporting people with substance issues.

It now has permission from Oxford City Council to work on the building, officially changing its use from a shop to a community support hub.

Head of city development Michael Crofton-Briggs said: “This would provide an important community facility without having an adverse effect on the vitality and viability of the Blackbird Leys Road neighbourhood shopping centre.”

The Blackbird Leys base would be staffed by three people, two fulltime and one part-time.

As reported in the Oxford Mail, Lifeline Project’s Oxford drug rehabilitation services came to an end in March after helping drug addicts across the county for three years.

The service, formerly based in Cowley Road, had provided a daily abstinence-based support scheme for nearly 100 people since 2012. It provided users with a daily task and target to achieve five days a week as part of their daily lives.

But that came to an end after the county’s drug and alcohol services were transferred to social enterprise Turning Point.

Oxfordshire County Council made the decision in January after a tendering process to combine the services provided by Lifeline and Oxford Health in one place.

But manager Dee Dee Wallace said the charity was determined to remain in the county to support people. She told the Oxford Mail: “We are very committed to Oxford’s community and supporting people facing the biggest challenges in their lives.

“These are people who may be able to live fulfilling lives, particularly those people who may fall through the net.”

Ms Wallace would not reveal what Lifeline Project had specifically planned for the unit.

She said: “Things are very much still in the planning stages at the moment, but we are very excited about our future work in Blackbird Leys.

“We will be working closely with the new service providers and other partners to help people across Oxfordshire.”

The unit’s former owner Ian Austin, who opened a tattoo parlour in 2011, struggled with the rent after becoming ill and the death of his partner in 2012.

Despite support from readers after an Oxford Mail appeal, the parlour closed in 2013.

Prior to that it had been a betting shop and a dry cleaners.

Lifeline Project runs services across the UK with a range of services including recovery and peer mentoring, day programmes, criminal justice and prison initiatives, family work and services for young people.