A SHARP drop in rental income has forced the proposed closure of Moorside care home.

St John’s Winchester Charity says reduced income from its Winchester High Street properties, worsened by Covid, makes Moorside unsustainable.

Roger Bright, chairman of the board of trustees, said in the financial year 2020/21 rents dropped from £1.45m to £1m.

Running costs of Moorside were £1.96m but income from the NHS, county council and private-paying residents was only £1.17m leaving St John’s to find a subsidy of £880,000, up from £740,000 the year before.

Mr Bright said: “We have the situation where there are high costs of running Moorside at a time when our rental income is shrinking. With much heartache we have concluded this isn’t sustainable in the medium or long term.”

As a charity it is unable to charge market rates for its residents.

It has owned property in Winchester for hundreds of years and not as a result of recent acquisitions.

Clive Cook, chief executive, said Covid had hastened a trend on the High Street that had been noticeable for several years. Several properties leases are coming up for renewal. He said the days of 15-25 years leases with increases every five years have been “swept aside. Yields are going to drop.”

Mr Bright said rents may bounce back but not in the short-term that Moorside needs.

The charity is consulting residents and their families and other agencies such as the county council but closure could take place in the autumn.

It currently has 23 residents in a home with a capacity of 31. Normally it operates at 90 per cent capacity but Covid has disrupted people moving in. Only one resident has died with a positive test for Covid.

But with a small 31-capacity it makes the home very expensive to run.

Moorside has a staff of 53 and most would be made redundant, which is a “huge regret and sadness that we find ourselves in this situation for staff who have been magnificent during the pandemic,” said Mr Bright.

“The home has weathered the pandemic and to a considerable extent that is due to the dedication of the staff and all the trustees are hugely appreciative of the dedication they have given.”

One local woman, who asked not to be named, was sad at the news: “The plans have left us devastated. My mother has a particularly cruel and complex advanced form of Alzheimer’s. Previously she had been in another well known Winchester care home. But the care in Moorside has been so much better. In the general care home she became skin and bone, with no staff having the time to feed her. She was stuck in an uncomfortable wheelchair all day. In Moorside, she put on weight again and Moorside brought her smile back. It’s a special kind of care you get in Moorside. It takes a special level of care but also a high degree of compassion and patience to look after residents who are human beings at their most vulnerable.

“Moorside should be supported by the council if necessary. It is a model of dementia care. It feels like a family home not a care home. The closure would be breaking up families because the residents and the carers have such a close bond.”

“The staff have been beyond brilliant during the pandemic and will be devastated not just to lose their jobs but also the bonds they have developed with residents. Something is morally not right if a path-breaking care home offering affordable but superlative care, a bench-mark in dementia living space with a garden and memory rooms, is going to close. Moorside needs support not closure.”