The news that the private owners of Dalawoodie Nursing Home have agreed to the cancellation of their registration before the matter reached court, highlights the extent to which the care home system in the region is at “breaking point”, according to South Scotland MSP Colin Smyth.

The cancellation will mean the home closing on 28 October and the 23 residents having to be relocated to other homes, which Colin Smyth warns are “already bursting at the seams”.

Colin Smyth said, “The news that Dalawoodie is closing at the end of the month won’t come as a surprise to anyone as the Care Inspectorate reports have been utterly damning. However, that won’t be any consolation to staff who continue to work hard to deliver care with the support of the local NHS and also residents and their families who face the trauma of having to find a new home.  That won’t be easy given the fact that our other care homes are already bursting at the seams, not least because this is yet another private nursing home that has closed locally in a care home system that is at breaking point”.

“The local health and social care partnership need to stop sugar coating these issues and start being more frank with the public and Government about the utter collapse of social care services in our region. Our hospitals are full of patients that should be in care homes or at home, but aren’t because we don’t have the places or carers to deliver the support people need. I have never known such a catastrophic crisis than the one we are facing at the moment in social care and the Government are like rabbits caught in the headlights when it comes to finding solutions”.

“The priority in the short term is ensuring the residents of Dalawoodie find a new home and get the care they need. But we also have to significantly increase the pay for carers to try to fill the many vacancies we have and properly reward those who deliver care. In the long term we need a rethink of our whole care service because it is currently failing far too many families in our region and the staff trying to deliver care in impossible circumstances”.