IT is a far cry from existing care homes in which

residents sit in a shared lounge in front of a television and

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   proposed plans for village: The Lichfield site, left, an illustration of how the Chellaston site could look, above, and, right, the site as it is today

2. ​

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have their meals prepared from a central canteen.

Instead, residents in an extra-care village have their own

apartment, their own kitchen and their own community.

The areas they do share sound more like something from a

hotel or holiday brochure – a Jacuzzi, gym, beauty salon and

craft workshop

And all this with the added benefit of care staff on site 24

hours-a-day, caring for residents as they would in a care home

– helping them to wash, eat or take medication.

This sort of village has been around for several years in

other parts of the Midlands, such as in Lichfield.

Now, Derby City Council plans to bring the successful model

to Derby and will work with the Extra Care Charitable Trust to

create a complex for people aged 55 and over, subject to

planning approval.

It would be the first such “village” in the county with all

its own facilities, including a village hall, gym, computer

suite, arts and crafts centre, restaurant, lounge and coffee

bar, hairdressing and beauty salon, landscaped grounds and a

greenhouse. Other such villages also include a shop.

Those benefits would be commercially run with the

possibility of some subsidies for things like the gym.

People in sheltered accommodation currently often need to

leave those homes when they need someone to be nearby 24 hours

a day but sheltered housing only has wardens, not care

staff.

However, under the extra-care scheme at Chellaston, fewer

people would need to leave their homes because the care would

be on site.

At its other sites, the trust provides the care staff but it

has not been decided whether that model would be repeated in

Derby or whether the council would provide the carers.

Ruth Skelton, cabinet member for adult services and health

at Derby City Council, said that other cities had started to

build extra-care villages several years ago.

“This type of scheme has certainly proved its worth

elsewhere,” she said.

“I visited a scheme in Lichfield which has been very popular

but that was set up quite a while ago, whereas ours would be

brand new.

“We are perhaps a little behind in Derby but this is a great

scheme.”

The city council was awarded £3.5m of money from the

Department of Health to put towards the scheme in Chellaston,

which would be created on land next to Woodlands Farm.

The total cost of the scheme would be around £46m.

The rest of the money would be put in by the Extra Care

Charitable Trust which is working with the council.

The trust is a Coventry-based charity which works with local

authorities and housing associations to build and run

extra-care sites.

Of the 250 apartments planned for Chellaston's village, 30%

would be for sale, 50% available for shared ownership and 20%

for rent.

The city council would be able to have nomination rights

over the rentals, meaning a board of people from the authority

and other partners, such as the Primary Care Trust, could

choose who goes into the apartments.

The charitable trust would get back its investment through

the sale of flats and rent from the apartments.

Details of prices have not yet been worked out.

In other areas where similar schemes have been created, the

trust has funded the village centres, including the gym and

village hall facilities, through appeals in the community.

A spokesman for the trust said: “We often launch appeals for

funding, which comes in the form of donations, and also local

businesses in the regions and corporate donors support us.”

An application has not been lodged yet for planning

permission but the aim is to have contractors on site before

the end of next year, so first residents could move in during

2011.

The village would be a private estate and its facilities

would also be opened to other elderly people in the area.

There are smaller extra-care sites being developed in the

city but none to the same scale as Chellaston's proposed

village.

Tomlinson Court, in Alvaston, has received £3.8m of

Department of Health funding towards the £5.5m scheme, which

will have 38 apartments and be managed by Housing 21, a major

housing provider, with care staff provided by the city

council.

The council will put in £100,000 and the balance, £1.6m,

will be provided by Housing 21.

And care staff have been brought into the Retail Trust

Leylands complex, in Broadway, to provide extra-care. The

estate is also undergoing redevelopment of certain areas to

extend the extra-care it is able to offer.

In total, the council, through the creation of more

developments, aims to have 240 extra-care scheme flats by

2009.

Extra-care is seen by the council as the future for how

elderly people will be cared for, giving them dignity and

privacy but also a sense of community.

When led by Labour last year, the authority wanted to close

Bramblebrook House care home, in Mickleover, to fund such a

development.

It said there would not be the demand in the future for such

residential homes, as elderly people's expectations for housing

and demands increased.

Now the new Liberal Democrat-led council has agreed not to

pursue the closure, while a review of all care homes is carried

out.

But the authority has also not ruled out a place for care

homes and specialist care, such as for dementia.

Ms Skelton said she was committed to developing more extra

care.

“The plans for Chellaston will be different from the

extra-care sites we are working on, because those are

adaptations of existing buildings, whereas this will be built

from scratch and be a village-style development,” she said.

“I have seen such schemes elsewhere and they mean people can

stay in their own homes for longer, which causes them less

disruption.

“They also have a great mix of people, from those who need

no care to those whose needs are quite intense and that mix is

important in creating a real community.”

The vision for Chellaston has been welcomed by Help the

Aged.

Lizzie McLennan, senior policy officer for Help the Aged,

said: “We support anything which improves choice for

people.

“We like to improve the generational mix and so would

welcome things like opening some facilities up which encourage

different ages, such as a creche.”

A spokesman for the Extra Care Charitable Trust said it

aimed to make its villages affordable and that they were open

to people on benefits.

In fact, the trust provides benefit staff at its villages to

help people claim all the help they are entitled to.

The spokesman said: “In one of our schemes in Northampton,

we actually identified £500,000 in unclaimed benefits.

“We do everything to ensure it is affordable for

people.”

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