A failed care home for OAPs is set re-open with much younger residents.

Eldercare, owners of Ashleigh Care Home in Huddersfield, has been given the green light to convert it into 26 bedsits.

The Newsome facility was closed by health inspectors last year after a litany of safety and care issues were found.

On one occasion a visiting official from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) had to step in and help a patient who was suffocating after staff ignored a pensioner who was face down on a bed.

Ashleigh Care Home, Stile Common Road, Newsome
Ashleigh Care Home, Stile Common Road, Newsome

Inspections of the Stile Common Road home also found it to be filthy with a number of residents not receiving adequate care and attention.

The home was given the lowest rating by the CQC and subsequently shut down last autumn.

Now the Fartown-based firm has decided to use the premises to offer budget accommodation.

Its plans to revamp the large premises have been approved by Kirklees Council.

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Eldercare says it will rent the rooms to students including overseas healthcare trainees such as doctors, nurses and clinical workers.

Only 13 of the rooms are ensuite with the rest asked to share bathroom facilities.

The firm says it will increase the number of rooms with showers over time.

Eldercare still runs a number of care homes in West Yorkshire including Sun Woodhouse and Cowlersley Court in Huddersfield and Elm Royd at Brighouse.

The Examiner asked Eldercare to comment on its student lodging plans but no one was available.