PLANS for a 60-bed care home for Knowle have won
councillors’ support, though it will need Government backing.
Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council’s planning committee
this month backed the plan for land at Old Silhillians Sports Club, Warwick
Road .
The club wants to sell the land – currently occupied by a
caretakers’ cottage close to the entrance – to put £1.2m to a £1.5m refurbishment and extension to
the club house.
The two to three-storey care home – by Gracewell Healthcare
– would cater for people with dementia and create 38 full-time and 30 part-time
jobs.
The committee said it would approve the plan – which would
have 23 parking spaces - if it is supported by the Government’s National
Planning Casework Unit.
In December, the committee rejected the scheme as the benefits
to the club do “not outweigh the substantial harm to the Green Belt”.
Yet Gracewell supplied further information arguing there was
a lack of suitable care facilities in the borough and would provide 15 places
for council social care.
The building has the “smallest size possible” and the site
is the only one “suitable, available and deliverable” a council officers’
report said. To see visualisations of how it will look from the road click here.
As the land is in the Green Belt, the plan would have to
fall under “very special circumstances” planning laws.
The report said: “For reasons of the important function the
club fulfils in the provision of play space vs the threat to its future
survival of the club, it is considered that this case does amount to very
special circumstances.”
It said the clubhouse needs re-wiring, heating improvements
and better changing rooms as these do not meet sporting standards.
Some 56 residents wrote to the council to support the plan
with a 113-signature petition and letters from Sport England; The FA; England
Hockey Board; and the Rugby Football Union.
One said: “Through providing investment in the clubhouse the
care home scheme will be directly investing in Solihull ’s
amateur sports community and help sustain independent sports clubs at this
site.”
Three neighbours objected with one saying: “The scale,
height and massing of the proposed care home buildings far exceeds the
previously developed extent of the site.”
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