COMMUNITY leaders and residents tonight condemned plans to spend £442,000 demolishing an Oxford office block and sell off the site for housing.

Oxford City Council’s executive decided to knock down the Northway Centre in Dora Carr Close — despite significant local and political opposition. Opponents want the building to be brought back into community use.

Headington city councillor David Rundle said: “I wish the executive board would listen to residents rather than thinking it knows what’s best.

“It’s going to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds to demolish the building.

“Is it in the interests of taxpayers across the city and the people of Northway?

“This certainly isn’t the time to try to sell land.”

Last month, the city council’s communities and partnership scrutiny committee “called in” the executive board’s plans to demolish the centre, which the Labour administration said would save annual running costs of £73,000.

But members of the committee argued that there had been no consideration of alternative uses for the site, such as youth or community facilities, and that there “appeared to have been no consultation with community groups”.

Committee member Mohammed Altaf-Khan, ward councillor for Headington Hill and Northway, said: “The scrutiny committee advised not to demolish the building but to use it for community use, particularly youth or leisure.

“Both the scrutiny committee and local residents have been ignored. I’m disgusted.”

Council leader Bob Price stood by the decision to abandon the centre, saying it would cost between £1m and £2m to make it suitable for community use, adding: “We simply don’t have the money.”

The Northway Centre, which is largely empty except for 25 council staff, adjoins Northway Community Centre and a sports hall — which are unaffected by the proposals.

Mr Price said the council aimed to recoup the cost of demolishing the building by selling the site on the open market for affordable housing. Demolition work is expected to start next month and be completed by October.

Northway Residents’ Association chairman Betty Fletcher said: “I’m absolutely gutted — we don’t feel we have been listened to.

“If they pull the centre down and build houses, we will get nothing.

“The city council shouldn’t be selling off its land. It’s going to cost half a million to pull it down.

“They should use the money to benefit local people.”