Disabled woman is only resident living in 50-room care home

SWNS

A disabled woman is the only resident living in a 50-room care home after it closed down - leaving her with nowhere else to go.  Jackie Kennedy, 53, moved into the Blue Ribbon assisted living complex in January 2023 after being diagnosed with a string of chronic health issues.  She has a damaged spine which restricts her movement as well as suffering with spondylitis and fibromyalgia.  Despite enjoying a new lease of life in the sheltered housing complex in Coventry, bosses decided to close it down last year.  The other residents moved into alternative accommodation but Jackie refused to leave and has been handed a section 21 eviction notice.

Transcript

00:00I'm Jackie, Jackie Kennedy. Due to my ill health and disabilities, I gave up a lovely

00:11house on GP calling me with Blue Ribbon Court, arranging the appointment for me to come in

00:17and view the following day, which I did with a friend. She'd come round the property with

00:25me, one of the managers in the property here. I moved in when it was all occupied. It was,

00:31you know, NHS staff coming and going, ambulance crews taking patients in and out. On the September

00:38when I got the tenancy, obviously the flat I wanted decorated because it needed tidying,

00:44so I had to pay a decorator to decorate it for me before I moved in. So, I initially

00:50moved in on the January of 23. All the residents were out here in the garden, we'd sit on

01:00the landings chatting, and then talks of things happening with the building, and then the

01:08charges always being made, a £50 a week, where the other tenants weren't being charged

01:13that. They were telling me, why are you paying that £50? When all the other tenants were

01:19telling me they weren't. And then in September of 2023, we were all given the Section 21 notices.

01:28It was chaos. It was, you know, patients were still obviously going to and from hospitals,

01:35with the ambulance crews, you know, parents or families visiting the residents. It was,

01:40it was nearly full. It was, it was very busy, very busy place, the canteen, the lounge,

01:46the TV room, people sitting on the landings in the evening, we were chatting. And then

01:53meetings happening in the lounge just over here with the council, individual people having

01:58different meetings because of different needs. And then from there, it was just, tenants

02:06were being taken in and out with the two managers in the cars, and then I'd ask them when they

02:13come back, oh, where did you, oh, I've just been to view this, this building, or I've

02:17just been to view that. And I'm thinking, oh, my turn will come. Never ever did. Never.

02:23I've never been taken by anyone to view any properties, not one. And I've, I've located

02:29so many empty properties in the area that I've grew up in, in CB6. Since then, I was

02:34born in Coventry, always lived in CB6. And I'm just, I don't know how I'm coping, I don't

02:41know how I'm still holding it. I'm, you know, I'm very on edge, suicidal, and it's like

02:49an empty prison. I feel like I'm a criminal. And I've got multiple disabilities, very severe

02:55and chronic. I'm on multiple opioids, I'm on a cocktail of medications. And these, these

03:02guys, Green Square, they've just no empathy, and they've been turning the lifts off, so

03:07that I can't access getting up and down in the building. Ambulance crews have reported

03:14this when I've had them out to attend to me, that they've reported that this is a safety

03:19issue, that if people needed to get to you in an emergency, or if you had to get out,

03:23you know, things, that this was all happening. And still to this day, there's no help. There's

03:29no, you know, here's this property, or we'll take, there's been none of that. No viewings

03:34at all. And I don't know why I've done nothing, absolutely nothing wrong, but made the worst

03:39decision in moving here. I wish I didn't make the move, because I was told by my solicitor

03:47and other residents that this place is closing down. It was in the grapevine, apparently,

03:54that so they, they knew this place was shutting down. And yet they, they took me, they let

04:00me move in here knowing that I'd one day be evicted, and that I had a lovely one-bedroom

04:06house that then they shouldn't have took me on, they shouldn't have let me move in. To

04:12leave me here alone, it's cruel, it's absolutely cruel. It's lonely, I'm isolated, and it's

04:21frightening.

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