A CARE home in the Rhondda has been saved after councillors decided not to close it until a new home is open in the area.
On Wednesday, January 22, Rhondda Cynon Taf (RCT) cabinet decided to keep Ferndale House in Ferndale open until a new care home is built on the former Chubb Factory site in a few years time.
The council had been considering closing it because it said it doesn’t meet modern standards required to provide continuing high level and quality care accommodation which has led to low resident numbers over a prolonged period and the care home becoming no longer financially sustainable.
But Councillor Gareth Caple, cabinet member for health and social care, suggested they retain the home until the new one is operational and then close Ferndale House then.
Local councillors Jayne Smith and Susan Morgans spoke at the meeting in favour of keeping it open.

Cllr Smith said that there is no doubt the new home is welcomed but raised their duties in terms of people’s mental health and emotional well-being.
She said that keeping Ferndale House open is going to save the council money in the long run.
Cllr Smith said that they pride themselves as a council that listens to residents saying this would not be seen as a u-turn but more that they value their participation in the decision making process.
Clllr Morgans said she understands the financial pressures the council is facing and is grateful for the funds for the new home.
But said she’d like the council to honour the original commitment to keep Ferndale House open until the new facility is completed to ensure continuity of care and well-being for residents and staff adding that a premature closure would have a detrimental effect.
She said it would cause transport problems as it would take two buses to reach any home outside the Rhondda Fach and that they need to consider the “exceptional” staff who had been so loyal.
She said they are always commended for their high standard of care and had offered to increase their hours to enable extra beds to be available.
Cllr Morgans said they would risk losing staff with years of experience in the industry and they need experienced staff to transition to the new home.
She also said they need respite resources and that Ferndale House is filling a gap.
She asked how they could justify taking away this respite provision as there would be none in the Rhondda Fach.
Cllr Morgans said: “It would be a travesty to move these residents prematurely and potentially lead to two relocations.”
She said: “We need our home. We need our staff.”
Cllr Caple, the cabinet member said he was mindful to suggest that they are able to keep Ferndale House open until the new site is operational and at that point Ferndale House would be decommissioned.
The leader of the council, Councillor Andrew Morgan, said there had been some “misinformation” about the new home and said they are absolutely building the new home and that it is categorically not the case that they aren’t.
The aim is for something to be submitted for planning this year, begin construction in 2026 and for it to be completed in 2028.
He also said there had been misinformation claiming that the new home would be privatised.
RCT reviewed its residential care home provision in August, 2024, and the review found there was a “continued oversupply” of residential care home beds and that in light of the proposed extra care developments there was sufficient residential care provision to meet current and future demand.
Whilst the population analysis forecasts an increase in dementia amongst the population as it ages, the current provision that includes
additional dementia capacity at Tegfan and Parc Newydd alongside the development of a purpose-built facility in Ferndale is considered to be sufficient for current and anticipated future demand, the cabinet report said.
The report said that over recent years, analysis had shown that the number of residents in a care home at the end of each financial year had fallen in Rhondda Cynon Taf despite an expanding older population.
Between 2016/17 to 2023/24, care home placements reduced by 8% overall.
Over the same period, there had also been a change of care category for residents, between general residential and residential dementia.
In terms of bed vacancies, there were 127 in RCT care homes as at December 9 with 42 in residential, 55 in residential dementia, 27 in nursing and three in nursing dementia.
In Ferndale House there were seven residential and seven residential dementia bed vacancies.
The report said that in 2023/24, the council’s residential care home service significantly overspent, attributable mainly to “under achievement of income” due to low occupancy levels, with this position continuing into the current financial year (2024/25).
It said the unit cost was significantly higher for Ferndale House and Cae Glas care home in Hawthorn compared to the other council care homes and was significantly higher than the weekly fee paid to the independent sector in 2023/24 of £772 and £818 for residential and residential dementia care home placements respectively.
Most people who responded to the consultation disagreed with the proposal to close Ferndale House with 93.4% disagreeing and of those 89.4% strongly disagreeing.
The main messages from older people and their families at Ferndale House related to distress at the possible impact on the health and wellbeing of their family member, concern with regards to the accessibility of alternative placements for families of the same quality and cost and anger and frustration that previous commitments made for Ferndale House were not to be honoured.
In response the council said that: “Whilst it is acknowledged that the majority of respondents to the consultation are not in favour of Ferndale house decommissioning in advance of the opening of the new care home being developed on the former Chubb Factory site, the council has to balance these views with other competing factors highlighted in this report in order to make sure the council invests its resources in the right way so that all residents of Rhondda Cynon Taf can get the right level of care to meet their needs now and in the future.”