Consultation on the future of Oban’s Lynnside Day Centre and two others in Argyll should be carried out with no associated assumptions of savings or service closures, health chiefs have been told.
Oban North and Lorn Councillor Kieron Green, also Argyll and Bute Council’s depute policy lead for care services, told a meeting of the Health and Social Care Partnership’s Integration Joint Board that as well as not going ahead with a savings option that would shut the three units, the Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) should revise a proposed review of older adult day services, emphasising this will be led by engagement with staff, service users, their families and wider communities.
The meeting on Wednesday March 27 put closure plans on hold. The proposals had sparked a furious response from the public.
The HSCP had put forward a savings option to gradually withdraw day care services also from Thomson Court Day Care in Rothesay and Struan Day Care in Dunoon.
Officials from the HSCP said that for 2024-25 a savings target of £160,000 was reasonable from the withdrawal of service.
That saving would largely be delivered through the non-replacement of currently vacant posts, said a report.
However, Councillor Green told the meeting the cost of providing the services could be met from savings made in payments to a pension fund.
Mid Argyll councillor Douglas Philand backed Councillor Green’s amendment to put the proposal on hold.
The HSCP’s report had said the withdrawal of the services would be "mitigated to some extent by the development, where possible, of community-based approaches to day support, within the community and the more flexible use of self-directed supports”.
Councillor Green said: “I am probably not the only board member who has received a lot of correspondence about day services, particularly for older people.
"It is my opinion that we have to be seen to do the right thing in terms of engaging with service users, their families and other parts of the community on the future of these services.
"It should not be pre-determined by financial constraints. In terms of the £160,000, am I right in thinking that could be added to the £1.2 million being funded from the pension fund saving?”
James Gow, the HSCP’s head of finance and transformation, said: “I am well aware of some of the issues you have described, and if the board wishes to approve the budget with that saving removed, that would be an option we could suggest to the council.
"I do not think you would have a huge amount of resistance to that change.”
The board’s chairperson Councillor Amanda Hampsey, Oban South and the Isles, said a delegation had wanted to speak but could not because of regulations.
“But it is important to relay to the board that it was their intention to come and ask for any proposals for these services to be taken away to be refused, or at the very least reconsidered," she said.
Councillor Philand then said: “Often we would say that if we were going to redesign a service we would go out to the third sector, but we have outlined the difficulties we are going to face.
"The thing that hits me in the face is that if this potentially were to go forward, it is the people at home, who care for people, are the ones we really need to focus on.
"That is just the truth from the representations which I have had as well. I would certainly welcome Councillor Green’s suggestion for this year to fully fund it from the reserves we are talking about.”
Councillor Green’s amendment to not proceed with the savings option also said that the HSCP should revise a proposed review of older adult day services "emphasising this will be led by engagement with staff, service users, their families and wider communities”.
He also asked that the engagement had “no associated assumptions of savings, service closures, or direction of users to alternative provision."
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