College given £25m grant

The £24.8m grant from the Learning and Skills Council is equivalent to 87 per cent of the cost of a £30.5m project to rebuild Abingdon and Witney College's Witney campus.

Most college building projects get just 40 to 50 per cent from the Government and are expected to raise the rest themselves through selling land and moving to new sites.

Steve Billcliffe, the college's development director, said: "It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for west Oxfordshire.

"This is a very significant amount of Government funding."

Plans for the new college, which was formed in 2001, are on display around Witney and people are being invited to comment through the planning process.

If approval is gained, work on the site could start in June.

Mr Billcliffe added: "We are going to have to borrow the rest from the bank on a mortgage, but this level of grant means we will be able to stay where we are.

"It is an expensive build and it is going to take three years to complete but, at the end of it, we will have a state-of-the-art campus."

When the campus is built, new catering and hairdressing courses will be on offer, in addition to updated computer, media, film and music technology facilities.

Mr Billcliffe said: "Along with what else is planned it is going to bring a whole new feeling to the centre of Witney and we are going to be right in the middle of it."

The development will include new student accommodation across almost 7,500sq m, including nearly 500sq m of specialist accommodation for students with higher level learning support needs.

As part of the development, the redundant Welch Way ambulance station will be bulldozed to open up a walkway into the campus.

Witney has 600 full-time students, aged 16-18, and about 2,000 adult and part-time learners, with a staff of about 200.

Earlier this month, we reported that main building work was expected to start before Christmas this year - with completion of the project expected in early 2011.