FORTY five industrial units will be built on part of a former cables factory site in Newport, councillors agreed.

The Welsh Assembly Government won outline planning permission for the scheme, which will be used for employment development, at the former Pirelli site off Telford Street, Lliswerry.

Councillors gave the goahead to the plans – which could see five blocks of up to 45 units with employee and visitor parking – at a meeting on Wednesday.

The development will take up 1.84 hectares of the site, which is already home to a similar industrial development.

The plans, which will now have to be ironed out in a further detailed planning application, will together with agreed plans for 200 homes, transform the derelict site that has been empty for more than a decade.

Access to the area will be via nearby Telford Street and Lliswerry Cllr John Griffiths asked for assurances that existing residents who live in surrounding streets would not be inconvenienced by the reopening of a number of blocked off roads, which have been cul-de-sacs for around 20 years.

He said: “If there was any attempt to open them up, there would be uproar and pandemonium. It would be totally unfair after a long length of time.”

His colleague Cllr Allan Morris echoed his concerns and said he hoped industrial vehicles would not be able to use the surrounding streets as rat-runs.

Members were assured by planning officers that Telford Street would be the only access to the site and permission was granted with five votes to one.