THE director of the York-based Living over the Shop scheme is hoping to win more support to get Government funding for a national scheme.

Ann Petherick showed York MP Hugh Bayley around one of the flats created by the scheme in the city centre, which aims to bring back more properties into use.

She has already met the Housing Minister, Hilary Armstrong, to ask for more funding for the national scheme and has sent in proposals for an information service.

She said the property which Mr Bayley visited in Market Street had been empty on the two upper floors for many years until they were converted in 1995.

Since then, both tenants have been delighted. One of them, a 38-year-old social worker, who has a third-floor two-bedroom flat, said:

"The advantages are the safety and security of living above a shop and the fact that I am right in the middle of the city. I can walk to work and never need to get taxis home. The only disadvantages are that there are no late-night mini-market and early morning deliveries can sometimes be noisy. But I would recommend living above the shop to anyone."

Mr Bayley was also taken on a tour of other buildings in the city centre where upper floors were vacant and where the same kind of conversion could take place.

Ann said: "Just within a few minutes' walk of here I know of around 20 buildings with similar potential and, between them, these could create more than 100 flats." Ann works with housing associations and property owners to develop new flats, but said the City of York Council did not use her service.

She said that converting the flats could generate more than £30,000 per year in increased council tax for the city.

Mr Bayley said: "We need more housing and making use of empty space on the floors above shops in town centres is a sensible way of providing accommodation without having to build new buildings. It helps to protect the green belt."

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.