A FORMER Newport police station, which was being used as a fetish club, could be turned into a house.

Last year the building, on Alexandra Road, Pill, was home to The Clink, hosting fetish nights and orgy nights.

But the club began looking for new premises following an outcry from local people, who complained that they saw customers entering and leaving The Clink in their fetish-wear.

Planning officers launched an investigation into the use of the building and served an enforcement notice on the adult club, telling them to cease using the site as a private members' club as they did not have permission.

Now, Newport council has received a planning application from A Hutchings to convert the building into a house.

Pill councillor Laura Buchanan-Smith has asked for a site visit to take place before the planning committee comes to a decision on the application. She said: "To my knowledge it hasn't been used for anything - apart from the club - for quite a few years.

"I want to go in there and have a look because I want them to put some conditions on it." Plans to turn the old station into four shops and two flats were rejected by the committee in November last year on grounds of highway safety - there would not be enough room for delivery vehicles.

The council's development control manager, Sean Hannaby, said at the time: "If it was all flats we could live with it, but four shops and two flats are too much." Plans to convert the building into a community centre have been rejected on two occasions, although an application to change it into a daycare nursery was granted in February 1999.

But the nursery never came to fruition.