Braintree council takes control of empty Parc building

The purpose-built Parc site is now overgrown after being empty for more than a year

A council has taken possession of a building formerly used by families of children with complex needs which has been left empty for more than a year.

The premises at Great Notley Country Park in Essex, closed when Parc (Essex), the children's charity operating it, closed.

Braintree District Council said the charity's trustees surrendered the lease to the property last week.

It said it would do what was necessary to "bring the building back into use".

About 140 families were affected by the sudden closure of the charity in June 2022 after at least £64,000 could not be accounted for.

The charity - which provided short breaks care for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities - has since been forced to wind up its operations. 

A lease wrangle was blamed for the building remaining empty.

Children's charity Parc (Essex) closed the site in Essex after running into financial difficulties

The council said it needed to allow Parc's liquidators access to the building to "call-in" the charity's assets, empty the building of its contents and tend to the overgrown grounds.

A new occupier with the right credentials would also need to be selected, the local authority said.Conservative councillor Kevin Bowers, who is responsible for resources and performance, said: "We need to make sure the building is cleared and the environment is safe and secure for users of the site before a new occupier can take on the building.

"We also need a robust process in place which selects a suitable organisation to take over the lease and take advantage of its specialist facilities.

"We need to get this process right because we know how important this building and the services it can support are to families and children with complex needs."The process was expected to take "several months", the authority said.

Dominic Collins, the council's director of growth, said it would work closely with Essex County Council, which is responsible for children's services, to find a tenant who would help the families it was intended for.

The county council previously said that following a recommissioning exercise, short breaks services were in place for families and those affected by the closure had been accessing alternative provision. The chairwoman of the Parc trustees, Janet Perry, said: "We are pleased to have reached this point of surrender, following on from the execution of governance processes required of the charity, which unfortunately delayed the transfer of the lease for much longer than anticipated."