38 disabled residents fight to stay in their care home
A “FAMILY” of physically disabled adults are fighting eviction from the care home where some have lived for decades.
The 38 devastated residents have until July 31 to leave but just 15 have found alternative accommodation.
Owners the Queen Elizabeth Foundation for Disabled People want to sell the Dorincourt Care Home in Leatherhead, Surrey, to pay a £2.6million pensions bill.
But campaigners say the charity’s expensive headquarters nearby could be sold instead with staff transferring to cheaper rented offices.
Matthew Jenkins, 31, who has muscular dystrophy and has lived at Dorincourt for 11 years, said: “I’m losing my friends and my home.
“Please stay open so that this nightmare will end. I have not found anywhere else to live yet and I am scared about my future. I have made some very close friends and we live like one big family. It will be upsetting for all of us to be split up.”
Wendy Hempkin has lived at Dorincourt for 32 years and met the late Queen Mother on her visits to the charity set up in her name.
She said: “We should not be in this position of trying to save our home. It’s very wrong and we want the public to help us to stop the closure.” A “Save Dorincourt” petition on the website change.org has been signed by more than 40,000 people.
Residents all have complex physical support and health needs, use wheelchairs and have 24-hour care.
Some of them, aged in their twenties to late forties, also live with a learning disability. Matthew’s mother,
Jacqui Jenkins, who travels from Chippenham, Wiltshire, to visit him, said: “I am in despair. I am extremely anxious about the fate of Matthew and the other residents at Dorincourt.
“It is their home, their family, their whole life.With less than three months to go, only a handful of residents have found alternative provision.”
Needs
On the QEF website, Karen Deacon, chief executive, said: “We are working closely with Surrey Adult Social Care to achieve good outcomes for all residents at Dorincourt and Surrey are also liaising with other authorities.”
A Surrey County Council spokesman said: “We’ve been working closely with the provider and 18 other authorities, which fund people at the service, to make sure residents move to new homes that meet their needs.”