CABINET members at Cheshire East Council will next week discuss the permanent closure of two of Knutsford adult care centres.

Councillors will discuss the fate of Bexton Court and the Stanley Centre when they meet in Sandbach on Monday, September 5.

Bexton Court – the specialist dementia unit – has been temporarily closed for a year, while users of the Stanley Centre were hit by the removal of vital transport links after the authority amended its adult care transport policy earlier this year, with users having to use taxis to get to the centre instead.

But Cheshire East Council is to ask its cabinet to ratify proposals that will see ‘service users’ having to travel as far as Congleton and Macclesfield for their care.

Allostock resident Charlotte Peters-Rock said the town’s disabled and elderly were being ignored.

“These disgraceful actions seem to be designed to be pushed through, against all opposition, so that there will be no facilities within easy reach of anyone who lives in the Knutsford area,” she said.

“Dragging the disabled and elderly across the county, especially in the Macclesfield direction with its permanent traffic jams morning and evening, is designed to kill the old sooner rather than later.

“Perhaps they should just stop paying for so disgraceful a lack of service and instead put the money towards some community facility in Knutsford?”

Clr Roland Domleo, cabinet member with responsibility for adult services, said: “Cheshire East Council is talking with staff and people who use the services at Bexton Court and Stanley House so that we can hear all about the positive and negative aspects of the service within these buildings.

“Bexton Court is temporarily closed but we have been providing local dementia services for people elsewhere during this time.

“Stanley House is a massively under-used building, so naturally we need to find out from people why this is the case.

“Many of our buildings are very out-dated and this is why we are talking about options to move some services to Wilmslow, Congleton and Macclesfled leisure centres which could form the heart of our ‘lifestyle’ provision.

“We will be discussing with people in Knutsford what community facilities we need to develop and how people wish to use their personal budgets to meet their individual needs.

“This valuable feedback will help shape our recommendations for the council’s cabinet meeting in December.

“We would like to reassure service users and their families that this is not about a loss of service, but a shift in how we better deliver essential services to some of our most vulnerable service-users.”

The cabinet meeting takes place at Cheshire East’s offices in Middlewich Road, Sandbach at 2pm on Monday, September 5.

If you would like to attend the meeting but do not have transport, contact Charlotte Peters-Rock on 01565 722738 or via email at charlottepetersrock@tiscali.co.uk.

What do you think about the authority’s plans to close two adult care centres in Knutsford? Let us know by emailing the newsdesk at knutsford@guardiangrp.co.uk, on our website at knutsfordguardian.co.uk or on our Facebook page.