Parents fear day centre closures

Parents of adults with learning disabilities fear two day-care centres in Birmingham will close.

Maureen Pugh, from Northfield, said Collingwood Day Care Centre was "gold dust" and provided essential respite care for her disabled daughter.

She is among parents who have seen a leaked city council document in which officers recommended Collingwood and Hockley centres should close.

The council said a final decision would be made after a public consultation.

Ms Pugh said she feared Collingwood was earmarked to close next March, after seeing minutes from a Budget Recovery Group meeting held last month.

'Happy' place

In the document seen by the BBC, council officers said they recommended closing the day centres because they were under used and the buildings were in a poor state.

But Ms Pugh said Collingwood was not under used and she knew of about 100 users.

"There's always things going on, it's happy and the staff are absolutely wonderful," she said.

"We get five hours a day - so then I can catch up on sleep if she's kept me up all night, or go shopping.

"It's like gold dust, without that I don't know what I'm going to do."

'Rationalising' services

Birmingham City Council said a final decision had not been made on the two centres.

A spokesman said the matter would go before the council's cabinet on 15 December and a public consultation would follow.

He said the council was modernising its day centre services and wanted to cut some places.

Out of 926 places for people with learning disabilities, on average only 604 were used, he said.

Sue Anderson, cabinet member for adults and communities, said of the review: "We are not going to take services away from people at all.

"It's a way of rationalising what we have got."