Inspector backs council after rejecting Wolverhampton children’s home
An appeal over a bid to open a children’s residential home in Wolverhampton has been thrown out by a government inspector.
City of Wolverhampton Council has twice rejected planning applications to convert a six-bed home in Codsall Road, Wolverhampton, into a residential home for children saying it was not needed.
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The local authority rejected a move in 2024 to convert the home for up to four children, and then turned down another application to use the home for up to three children last year.
The applicant Support and Sustain Care Ltd appealed to the government’s planning inspectorate in a bid to get the council’s ruling overturned but was unsuccessful.
The government inspector agreed with planners at City of Wolverhampton Council and said the need for the residential home had “not been adequately demonstrated.”
The planning inspector said in the rejection: “The appeal scheme would result in the loss of a single family house and based on the specific evidence before me in this appeal, including the comments from children’s services, the need for the appeal scheme has not been adequately demonstrated.
“Thus, given the absence of local need for the proposal, the appeal scheme would result in the loss of family housing.
“Whilst I acknowledge it would be a loss of a single dwelling house it remains a loss nonetheless in an area which is unable to provide an adequate number of family houses for local need.”
City of Wolverhampton Council first rejected a move to convert the six-bed home into a residential home for up to four children in April 2024.
The local authority’s planners said the conversion would result in “greater levels of activity, noise and disturbance.”
In response, another application was then put forward to convert the home into a residential home for up to three children but that was also rejected by the council earlier this year.
The council said the loss of a six-bed family home would ‘inhibit it from reaching its housing targets’ and the city already had enough accommodation for vulnerable children.
“There is not a demonstrable need for additional private children’s care home accommodation within the city of Wolverhampton, and insufficient justification has been provided to outweigh the loss of a family dwellinghouse amidst growing housing targets,” the council said in a report outlining the refusal.
A statement included with the application for the residential home said: “The proposed development would provide an invaluable facility for a small number of vulnerable and neglected young people, offering a caring and nurturing environment that they may never have experienced previously.”
