Renewed calls not to close Burnham day centre for disabled people
Campaigner Hazel Howe and her son Thomas, who has been attending the centre for 13 years.
A campaign to keep open a Burnham day service for people with disabilities and complex needs is gathering momentum – securing national support and a 1,200-signature petition.
A public consultation by Buckinghamshire Council has been running over plans to reduce its adult social day care centres from seven to three to make financial savings.
This includes the closure of Burnham Short Breaks Day Service, which offers enrichment activities and outings for people with a range of complex needs.
Hazel Howe is the mother of Thomas, a 32-year-old man who has been attending the service for 13 years. She is among those who has been leading a campaign against its closure.
The consultation is now over but the fight goes on – with a petition against the changes receiving more than 1,200 signatures so far (tinyurl.com/bdf4z493).
This campaign also now has support from Mencap, a charity which supports people with learning disabilities, alongside campaigns in other parts of the country where similar changes are proposed.
Hazel has long been of the view that Burnham Short Breaks is irreplaceable, what with its specialist staff, capacity for personal care, wide corridors, garden, physio area and garden.
“People that have been over there – councillors, [Beaconsfield MP] Joy Morrissey, even the health professionals – have said they can’t believe that Burnham has even been considered for a proposal to close. It’s crazy,” she said.
“Ten years ago, they [Bucks council] spent nearly a million pounds on this. They made such a big thing of it. You can see it’s been refurbed not long ago. What a complete and utter waste of money. They have been really short-sighted on this.”
Suggested alternatives – such as Spring Valley Day Centre – have ‘very tired and old buildings’, she said, whereas others such as Aylesbury Opportunities Centre are ‘on the other side of the county.’
“It could take my son, in the traffic, up to an hour-and-a-half journey to get there,” Hazel said.
She added: “My son goes out twice a week – he has a pub lunch, he goes out to Costa. [The community] all know him.
“He's got a bit of independence, not just stuck in a building. He loves the familiarity, the routine. He loves that centre.”
Other people have been attending the Burnham centre for 20 or 30 years – and one, Neil, has been there for 40. They, too, stand to lose something precious, Hazel feels.
Neil, above, has been attending Burnham Short Breaks for 40 years.
Hazel had further concerns over alternative services based in centres split over multiple levels of a building.
“I worry for their health and safety if there was a fire. I would worry if the lift broke down and my son was in one of the activity rooms upstairs,” she said.
As well as the petition and the national campaign, another rally outside the centre is set for July, in which Joy Morrissey – who has long supported the campaign – is expected to attend again.
Mrs Morrissey told the Advertiser that visiting this centre and others on the chopping block ‘has been both eye-opening and deeply moving’ and it was ‘clear how essential these spaces are’.
Isobel Darby, Buckinghamshire Council’s cabinet member for health and wellbeing said: “To ensure full consideration is given to the feedback received to the consultation, a findings report (as well as a proposed service model for day opportunities and overnight respite) will go forward for the council's cabinet decision in late summer 2025.
“At this stage no decisions have been made. Any changes to how we deliver day opportunities and overnight respite services, if agreed, will be implemented after this decision and phased to ensure that every adult supported has the right suitable care in place to meet their needs.”
