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A worried parent has called the planned closure of a children's respite centre in Hereford "devastating".
Health bosses say No 1 Ledbury Road doesn't fit in with a new short-break foster service being introduced later this year. The facility, which has been open more than 30 years, provides respite care to children and young people with complex health needs.
"It's devastating," said Jaime Miles, whose 12-year-old son Corey attends No 1. "There is nothing else like this for our children. The fostering idea is just not suitable. It's not what we want or what we think is best for our children. It will have terrible effects on the children here."
She said No 1 not only meets respite needs but is also great for the socialisation and sensory needs of Corey – who has autism and severe learning disabilities – and others.
Her husband, James Miles, said many people are angry that no announcement regarding the future has been made public.
"Most parents have not yet found out," he said.
The new short breaks service has been developed by Herefordshire Council, the Wye Valley NHS Trust and Herefordshire Clinical Commissioning Group and will begin in November.
The three bodies say they are working with the families of those that use No 1 "to ensure that the services each child needs are made available to them and their family".
"Over the last two years, the local authority and health service has worked with the families and carers of those children to develop a range of services to provide community-based short breaks and also to increase access to the facilities that other children and their families use in the community," they said in a joint statement.
"During this time many families have told us they want a more personalised service tailored to the needs of each child and in a family setting.
"In developing a community-based short breaks service, Herefordshire Council, Herefordshire Clinical Commissioning Group and Wye Valley NHS Trust have jointly agreed that the No 1 Ledbury Road residential service does not fit with the community-based approach."
The groups say they have "already received interest" from potential foster carers who would like to provide the short breaks, and are appealing to anyone else interested in the role to contact the council's fostering team.
Wye Valley NHS Trust says it will try to redeploy No 1 staff elsewhere in the organisation once the current contract expires, which is believed to be early next year.
The news has angered county councillors Chris Chappell and Marcelle Lloyd-Hayes.
"You can't just train someone to look after the children," said Cllr Chappell. "It will take more than five months' training to do justice to them."
Cllr Lloyd-Hayes said she, as a recent vice-chairman of the Health and Social Care Scrutiny Committee, was not made aware of any planned closure.
"I acknowledge and accept services must update to meet the diverse needs of its clients, but closing this establishment should have come up for discussion at the Scrutiny Committee prior to this decision being made," she said. "People should always come before pounds."
Both members plan to bring the matter up at tomorrow's [Friday] meeting of full council at Hereford Shirehall.
Paul Broome
Thursday 16 July 2015
