Safety concerns see plans for children's care-home in Lancing refused

Normandy House, Old Shoreham Road, was proposed to become a children’s care home for a maximum of five children aged eight to 18, with four carers, two of whom would stay there overnight.

Adur District Council’s planning committee refused the application due to concerns over general safety of pedestrians in the area, it being an ‘inappropriate’ location for a care home, lack of access to services and congested site access.

Planning officers recommended the council approve the application, as no official objections had been raised by National Highways or other bodies.

They stated the building could operate outside of planning permission as a residential care home with six people or fewer, and so approving could be an opportunity for the council to impose conditions on the development.

Councillor Paul Mansfield (Con, Sompting) said he did not want the potential death of one of the children on his conscience if the application were to be approved and someone killed on the road.

He added: “We know the location, we know there’s been deaths on that road. It just worries me that we’re going to grant planning for this dwelling to have children that are in care. “How [could] we have voted for this to go through and then we find out years later there’s been a death here, how would you all feel? Because I know I would have a problem with it being on my conscience.”

Gabe Crisp (Green, St Nicholas) said the council ‘urgently’ needed more homes for children in social care, and if the road was truly as dangerous as members claimed then National Highways – the government-owned company charged with operating, maintaining and improving motorways and major A roads in England – would have objected.

Andy McGregor (Con, Widewater) said as ‘corporate parents’ for children in social care, the council would need to take into account their safety.

Concerns were voiced by residents at the meeting that the A27 was too dangerous to put a children’s care home next to, the access into the property was shared with neighbouring properties, and the border of the property was a metre closer to the road than neighbouring ones.

The owner of Normandy House said there was high demand for residential children’s homes across Adur, and that it could stop children in the district from being sent as far away as Scotland to be housed. He added the site was not shared or contested with neighbours.