Care home service downgraded

Vulnerable pensioners were last night set to lose vital roundthe-clock staffing at their sheltered accommodation.

About 130 OAPS at four sites in Canterbury and Whitstable have special tenancy deals which include 24-hour helpers under an enhanced care package.

But city councillors were being recommended to vote to downgrade the service, instead offering overnight reassurance via an intercom instead.

Campaigners against the plans had reacted with anger, with one claiming the council has a “moral obligation” to honour its earlier pledge.

As the Gazette previously reported, housing chiefs had spent years quietly planning to scale back the city’s enhanced sheltered provision.

Yet despite plans to cut back the overnight service, East Kent Housing (EKH) – the council’s social housing operator – contin- ued to allow vulnerable elderly tenants to sign up.

One, 91-year-old Peggy Coles, even sold her bungalow and registered – only to discover EKH’S plans five months later.

Sue Collard, whose mother and father-in-law are both enhanced sheltered housing tenants, had told the council’s communities community that its decision “lacked common sense”.

“It was advertised that one of the reasons for the elderly to consider a move to the establishment was so that they did not feel isolated or lonely,” she said.

“Without the staff there, all this social aspect will be gone.”

Enhanced sheltered housing – offered at Whitgift Court, Cranmer House and Collard House in Canterbury and Lang Court in Whitstable – is seen as a “halfway point” between independent living within sheltered housing and full residential care.

EKH has said that KCC has cut funding towards enhanced sheltered care to the tune of £105,000 per year. Last night the committee was set to meet again to sign off on the proposal.

Tenants will now be consulted on the proposal before a final decision is taken by the committee.

Ida Linfield, a former Liberal Democrat councillor and campaigner against the downgrading, had vowed to continue to fight against the proposed change.

“At the moment the tenants are still left with uncertainty,” she said previously.

“The security that a lot of them wanted from having someone there overnight will be gone.

“Even the most active members want that security.”