Part of a former Topshop in one of Kent's busiest shopping complexes could be converted into council offices.

Canterbury City Council's current premises in Military Road in the city are deemed too big and expensive to run – and could be sold-off for housing.

So the local authority is putting forward proposals to move into Whitefriars.

A combination of the first and second floors of Topshop in Whitefriars Street and the RBS building in Rose Lane are the most likely locations to be converted.

The former might include offices and meeting rooms - while the latter would be home to a customer reception, a print and mail operation and a small amount of office space.

Council bosses are particularly keen to leave the Military Road site as most of its staff are now working from home and will continue to do so.

They say keeping the current offices would not be very environmentally-friendly and think the site is better off being sold for housing.

Council leader Ben Fitter-Harding told KentOnline that Whitefriars is "a brilliant location for people to access with the bus station being so close".

He added: "If residents needed to see someone and visit, it would be so simple as it's just in the city.

"There's a lot of dead space above the shops in Whitefriars.

"It could maybe set a precedent for more space to be used for offices as it is a great location.

"The previous planned move to Wincheap would have cost £12 million - that's a big cost. Whitefriars would be far less."

A report by deputy chief executive Tricia Marshall, due to be considered by the policy committee at a meeting next month, says the advantages of the plan include using a space at Whitefriars that is difficult to rent out.

Meanwhile, it argues that having office workers in the city will help boost city centre businesses.

But some challenges are also highlighted.

They include: parking arrangements for council vehicles, conversion costs and moving the council’s computer centre while systems are moved into the cloud.

The authority also needs to finding a home for its CCTV control room but "this could co-locate with the Whitefriars control room".

The report says: “Repurposing unused space will have a beneficial economic impact on the city centre by increasing footfall and using space that is not currently generating any rental income but is incurring holding costs, though there will be some significant costs to converting retail and storage space into offices.

“However, any conversion costs will be substantially less than the capital receipt that could be generated from selling the Military Road site.

“The current Military Road offices are around 10,000m2 gross internal area (GIA). Pre-pandemic, the new requirement for the council was assessed as a bit less than 4,000m2

“Our response to the pandemic has shown that most staff can work from home most of the time.

“Some roles will remain office based due to job requirements or people’s personal circumstances but even after allowing for that, the assessment is that only 2,000m2 of space will be required.”

If the committee accepts the need to move to the next stage, work will include: coming up with detailed costings, designing the layout of offices and ensuring the plans comply with the rules affecting public bodies such as accessibility.

In 2019, the council had decided to build new offices in Wincheap but changed its mind in February of this year because of the financial challenges it is facing.

Topshop is among 40 city centre businesses to have closed during the pandemic.

The policy committee is due to meet at 7pm in the Guildhall, St Peter’s Place, on Monday, July 5.

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