FRAIL, elderly people, condemned to stay in hospital because there is no suitable alternative, are to get a new £8m facility in Tenterden.

Plans for the Public-Private Partnership 'state of the art' West View facility will go on show in Tenterden Town Hall on Monday, September 13 for three days.

Claimed to be the first social and health care centre in the country, West View, is to be built in the grounds of the West View Hospital, Rolvenden Road.

It will take over responsibility for 20 older people currently being cared for in the hospital, as well as about 35 residents of The Lindens residential home in Tenterden.

Sarah Buck, Kent County Council spokesman said: "Tenterden was the trigger for this project, which also involves a scheme in Margate.

"David Weiss, head of the council's Public-Private Partnership Team said Tenterden sparked off the social and health care centre, the first of its kind in the country.

"It was because of a very clear need expressed by the people of Tenterden over many years to provide and modernise the very old and obsolete hospital at West View.

"Patients who will move there are likely to be 55 and over with most in their seventies and eighties. We do not like the phrase bed-blocking - it is delayed transfer and there is a very low level of that in Kent and Medway.

"Of the 65 delayed transfers that exist at the moment only 19 are the responsibility of KCC because local authorities do not have a care home space available."

The head of Kent County Council's Older People Direct Services Unit, Kim Maslyn and Mr Weiss, will be on hand to answer questions about the project.

They will be joined by some of the nursing and care staff who will work at the centre, open to people in Tenterden, the Ashford district and surrounding areas.

The exhibition, which is open to the public will run between 9am and 5pm and will include a timeline on the history of the site.

The £8m development, funded by the government's Private Finance Initiative, will have 60 residential and nursing places, a day centre for up to 20 people and physio and occupational therapy sessions by appointment.

Cabinet member for Social Care and Community Health Peter Lake stressed: "It is groundbreaking for the NHS and Social Services to be working together in this way. The people of Tenterden will be hugely proud of what has been achieved when the centre opens next year. We intend to make it a centre of excellence for everyone."

Mr Weiss said: "West View will be a focal point for the older people of Tenterden. It will be a one-stop-shop for their needs."