Decision due on £10million Climping dementia care centre planned off A259

Healthcare Management Trust (HMT), a not-for-profit charitable provider of older persons care, wants to invest more than £10million in a new facility on land behind Baird’s Farm Shop and Cafe south of the A259.

The proposed buildings would be two-storeys high and designed to incorporate eight bedroom wings.

An application has been made by Brackley Investments on behalf of HMT to Arun District Council.

Clymping Parish Council has opposed the scheme and 20 letters of objection have been received from residents compared to 46 standard letters of support.

The council’s development control committee is due to discuss the application on Wednesday (November 14), with officers recommending refusal.

According to the application: “The propose dementia home strikes an appropriate balance between minimising visual impact while producing an efficient use of land as it provides the necessary 64 beds of accommodation with generous bedroom sizes and communal areas, along with pleasant grounds and sufficient car parking.”

The home would contain ‘destinations’ such as a cinema, hair salon, cafes and terraces overlooking the gardens.

But planners argued the proposed buildings would be out of scale with nearby development.

Their report said: “The demand for a dementia care home is accepted, but there is no satisfactory argument put forward as per criteria C of the policy to demonstrate why the proposal cannot be located elsewhere given the sensitivity of the location.

“The size of the development and extent of the site coverage would result in the integrity and objective of the settlement gap being compromised.”