Helen Ley MS Respite Care Centre is to close

I’ve just heard on the local news that the Helen Ley MS Respite care centre near Leamington Spa is to close as a buyer has not been found.

I’ve raised funds for this place so I am utterly disgusted about it. It is an excellent and valuable facility and it’s had a 2.3 million pound refurbishment done in 2007.

I didn’t have a problem with it being sold to a private company who would continue to run it, I thought it would be an attractive proposition.

I just can’t believe it. So disappointing!

Bill.

Hi Bill, I agree, very disappointing. I’ve never been to one of the respite centres but have recently been thinking that I could do with a holiday and that somewhere specially adapted for MSers, and with other MSers, would be just the thing. Trust me to come to this conclusion at exactly the same time that they are closing.

It seems that in the MSS research people said they didn’t necessarily want holidays with other MSers. I can’t help wondering if it’s an age thing. Maybe younger MSers want independent holidays abroad. Personally I would love to go to a nice place in the UK countryside for a week where all the other holidaymakers had MS.

Sad. A valuable resource lost.

Pat x

I think the MS Society have double standards when they criticise the government for cutting welfare benefits such as ESA, and then the go and close these centres. Some of them have had dedicated fundraisers who have raised money over the years, on the understanding that they were to be kept open. Similarly with people who have left legacies to the centres in their wills.

I have heard the arguments put forward by the MS Society, but I think they are wrong. By handing out grants, they may be helping more people numerically, but they are just spreading the jam more thinly.

Perhaps we should start a campaign "…Don’t let users of the respite care centres be the 'Hardest Hit’…"