AUCHINLEE’S last six patients leave in two weeks before the Campbeltown dementia care home closes, but more ‘very diffi- cult’ cuts are coming across Argyll to plug a £14m black hole in this year’s health and social care budget.
A crunch meeting to decide Auchinlee’s fate at Argyll and Bute Council last February agreed to keep the loss-making 24-bed specialist home open for a year until March 31, costing £291,000 from its cash-strapped coffers.
Its owners, Cross- Reach, a social care charity linked to the Church of Scotland, and Argyll and Bute Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) stated it was unsustainable due to huge sixfigure losses, including the high cost of recruiting agency workers to cover staff shortages in a rural area.