Recruitment is under way for a new learning disability care service in Cambridgeshire that will eventually create more than 50 jobs
Recruitment is under way for a new learning disability care service in Cambridgeshire that will eventually create more than 50 jobs. Building work on the £3m project on a five-and-a-half acre site at Glebe Farm, Upton, near Huntingdon, is nearing completion and it is planned to open in mid-April. The project to provide a supportive home for nine adults is being carried out by ISISS, the specialist services division of Suffolk-based Kingsley Healthcare Group, which has won national respect for its innovative approach to caring for people with complex needs. ISISS director Chris May said: “We are looking for exceptional individuals to fill the roles of nurses, support workers and maintenance staff.
“Our existing four learning disability services are all rated good by the Care Quality Commission and we want to recruit people with the right character and work ethic to ensure Glebe Farm matches our very high standards.” The commissioning of Glebe Farm would help to meet the acute shortage of places in Cambridgeshire for adults with learning difficulties and complex behaviours. Mr. May said: “We will cater mainly for people who are currently in long stay placements with very complex needs that the majority of learning disability services would not be able to cater for, some of whom consequently may have been placed out of county and will now be able to return to Cambridgeshire.” The development, designed by architects Feilden and Mawson, has seen the existing farmhouse extended and converted into three self-contained flats with a communal area and other facilities. Meanwhile, two new annexe buildings have been added to provide a further six flats. A part of the planning permission granted last summer, approval has been given for a large barn on the site to be turned into an indoor horse riding centre for use by the residents.
A courtyard will be made into two sensory gardens and plans have been drawn up for part of the land to be transformed into a wildflower meadow and a family farming facility. Mr. May said: “Our homes provide a homely, safe and secure living environment to enable the people we support to fulfil their potential and to achieve their goals and ambitions no matter what obstacles seem to be in their way. “When Decoy Farm, our first learning disability service, opened near Great Yarmouth, we set new standards with a nurse led facility that has proved highly successful in breaking down the revolving door syndrome where placements continually break down. “We have been highly successful in preventing re-admission to hospital for those who find it difficult to cope in a supported living service in the community.” He said such care facilities were in short supply, not just in Cambridgeshire but across the country, and this meant that people were sometimes placed a long way from their families. Mr. May said: “With this development, we have been led by the care commissioners in Cambridgeshire who flagged up the local need.”
A recruitment day at a local venue will be shortly announced; in the meantime, people are invited to apply directly for jobs by ringing Kingsley recruitment manager Beverley Lambert on 01502-502743 or email [email protected]
Caption: Chris May pictured on site.
