A large care home complex in South Bristol is to close, leaving relatives and council chiefs searching for alternative places for dozens of elderly and vulnerable people. Bristol City Council and the relatives of residents at the Amerind Grove Care Home have been told it will remain open until all the residents have been found somewhere else to live, but will close straight after that.
The care home is owned and run by the nation’s largest care home operator, HC-One. In a letter to relatives, HC-One’s managing director Geoff Edwards told them they can’t get enough staff to work there. Bristol Live understands the site - on prime development land close to the Tobacco Factory on North Street - is already being marketed for sale to developers.
The care home is a large number of bungalows spread out on a big 3.4 acre site located on Raleigh Road in Ashton Gate, just behind the Tobacco Factory on North Street and the Aldi supermarket. While there is no confirmation of what will happen to the site when the care home closes, Bristol Live understands there are already plans for hundreds of flats in six-storey buildings being drawn up, and initial contact has been made with city council planners by the site's agents.
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In the letter to relatives, Mr Edwards said recruiting staff was the biggest issue for Amerind Grove. “Despite our best efforts, and the investment of significant time and resources, for some time now at this home, due to specific local factors, we have struggled with recruitment and retention challenges,” he said.
“Against the backdrop of extreme recruitment difficulties across the whole sector, we have carefully considered how this situation is impacting our Residents and Colleagues, and the future of the care we are able to provide,” he added. “After carefully considering all our options, we have sadly concluded that it is in everyone’s best interests for us to plan to close Amerind Grove and for Residents to be supported by other homes in the local community.
“This decision has not been taken lightly and I appreciate it will be disappointing news for you to hear. Whilst we have chosen to make this announcement now, our absolute priority is that we only move forward with the closure in a way that can be managed safely within coronavirus health and safety measures. We will be working closely with Bristol City Council on the timelines of the planned closure, and we will contact you again to formally start the process and outline the range of practical support we will provide to make this process as smooth as possible for you and your loved one, which will include help finding a new placement, packing, and transportation,” he added.
The care home has been operating at only a third capacity for some time. It does have the capacity to care for 168 residents, and when inspectors visited in 2017, only three of the five units were open and just over 100 residents lived there. That has fallen considerably since then, and now only 52 residents are cared for there.
Each resident and their relatives should be assigned a care worker to arrange alternative provision. There is a mixture of residents there who are ‘self-funders’ - people who have more than £24,500 savings and have to pay for their care themselves - and those whose places are funded by Bristol City Council’s social services. The council funds places up to around £700-£800 a week, but a place at Amerind Grove costs more than £1,000 a week.
Last year, a BBC Panorama investigation found that HC-One, which owns Amerind Grove, was the country’s biggest care home provider and, through a complex network of holding companies was owned by Saudi Arabia’s Olympic showjumper Kamal Bahamadan.
The Panorama programme accused Bahamadan of making vast profits from 265 care homes around the country, and siphoning that money to offshore companies in the Cayman Islands. After the Panorama programme, HC-One told the Daily Mail: “As a private company that delivers an essential public good, the most important thing for us is to meet the needs of our residents… and to do this we need access to long-term finance so we can invest in our people and homes.
“In the past five years, our owners have enabled us to invest £145million in upgrading our homes, with a further £115million committed by 2022/23,” they added. “This far exceeds all the cumulative dividends and management fees they have received over the same period – a total of £32 million. We have always been a UK tax resident, pay full tax in the UK, and file our accounts at Companies House... We do not use our structure to artificially reduce our earnings,” they said.
A spokesperson for Bristol City Council said: “We have been informed that the owners of the private care home Amerind Grove, HC-One, have taken the difficult decision to close the care home and sell the property. Residents and their families are being supported through this process.
"As the hosting authority we are working closely with the owners, the other local authorities involved and alternative care providers to ensure that all 51 residents are supported to move to suitable accommodation with the appropriate care package for their needs. We’ve been assured by the owners that Amerind Grove will only move forwards with the closure process once all residents have been supported to find suitable alternative care arrangements," the spokesperson added. "Meetings between owners, residents and family members have taken place to explore the opportunities available.”
A spokesperson for HC-One told Bristol Live that they had huge issues finding staff to work at Amerind Grove, which was built around 1990 when the original Wills Tobacco Factories were demolished on the site.
“The health, safety and wellbeing of the individuals we support are our top priorities. As such, we regularly assess the quality and suitability of the service we provide in our homes," the spokesperson said. "Despite our best efforts, and the investment of significant time and resource, for some time now at this home, due to specific local factors, we have struggled with recruitment and retention challenges. This is a challenge that impacts the whole care sector, with the latest workforce data showing that more than 10% of all roles in the care sector are currently vacant, and vacancies in the sector have increased by 52% in the past 12 months.
“Against the backdrop of an extreme recruitment squeeze across the whole sector, we have carefully considered how this situation is impacting our Residents and Colleagues, and the future of the care we will be able to provide at Amerind Grove. We have very sadly concluded that it is in everyone’s best interests for us to plan to close Amerind Grove and for Residents to be supported by other homes in the local community.
“We are working closely with Bristol City Council and are supporting our Residents, their loved ones and our Colleagues through this process. We will only move forward with the closure process as it is safe to do so, and when our dedicated project team has supported every Resident to find suitable alternative care arrangements.”
“Once the home has been safely closed, and each Resident has been supported to find suitable alternative accommodation, we will begin moving forward with the sale of the property. Until that point, we do not know who the purchaser will be or what their plans may be for the future of the property.”
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