LIB DEMS IN ALARMING ACT OF HYPOCRISY

LESS than 18 months after Derby's Liberal Democrats declared themselves saviours of a care home, the same group of councillors has confirmed it will shut.

In an alarming act of hypocrisy, Derby’s Lib Dems have put the future of every care home in the city in doubt and confirmed that Bramblebrook House will close.

The same councillors spent two years opposing plans by the previous Labour-led administration to close Bramblebrook, after it became clear that it was impossible to retain.

In July, last year, the same councillors boasted that they had saved the home, giving false hope to every resident. And as recently as March, this year, Lib Dem cabinet member Ruth Skelton pledged not to shut the home. Now those words have proved to be hollow.

This is utterly shameless. I have no issue with the closure as it’s been clear for some time that the home cannot remain open. But I’m appalled at the opportunist campaign the Lib Dems have run.

They masqueraded as saviours and let the vulnerable residents and their families believe that Bramblebrook was sustainable, when the sad but inevitable truth was that it never was.

The campaign they fought while in opposition has now been shown to be completely without foundation. If they truly felt the home should remain open then that’s what they should have made happen when they won control of the council.

But they’re too weak to do that. Their policies in opposition were based entirely on opportunism, and their policy in control is to unquestionably bow to council officers.

Now they’ve gone too far in proposing to close all the council’s homes because there is an ongoing need for some traditional council run residential care provision.