by Simon Tulett

stulett@thekmgroup.co.uk

A consultation on plans to close care homes may have withheld key information about the proposal and given too little weight to alternatives.

That’s the concern of some councillors, who have called in the Audit Commission to analyse the decision by social services chiefs to close or sell off 11 homes across the county.

Members of Kent County Council’s cabinet scrutiny committee, which has reviewed the final verdict, believe residents and their families should have been given more information about the finances behind the proposal.

In the meeting it emerged that even before the consultation began the council had secured government approval for a £75 million private finance initiative (PFI) scheme to build extra care facilities for older people on five sites in the county.

Three of these involved land occupied by care homes now set to be axed and replaced with new homes, including Manorbrooke, in Bevis Close, Dartford.

KCC says its bid for the cash did not automatically mean it would go ahead with the care home closures, and that the PFI scheme would have found alternative land if councillors rejected bulldozing existing homes.

But Cllr Trudy Dean (LibDem), who chairs the scrutiny committee, said: “It’s clear members of the council and the public weren’t given the proper information. It leads me to consider whether the consultation was wholly honest.”

For the full story see this week's Dartford Messenger, out Thursday.