Salford care home for veterans reopens after £12.5m rebuild

The veteran care home has cared for more than 8,000 veterans since it first opened in 1916

A home which has cared for military veterans for more than 100 years has reopened after a £12.5m redevelopment.

Broughton House in Salford, which first opened in 1916, was demolished and rebuilt and now features 64 individual rooms, six apartments and a museum.

The home on Park Lane, which has cared for more than 8,000 veterans, will also house a non-residential support hub for local ex-service people of all ages.

Resident and D-Day veteran David Teacher said it was "excellent".

The original Broughton House building, which was demolished in 2020, started taking care of service personnel during World War One.

Its first resident was Charlie Fox, a Manchester solider who had been wounded and gassed at Ypres in 1915.

The private, who died in 1944, spent the rest of his life at Broughton House.

Mr Teacher said the new facilities were "excellent"

Mr Teacher, who was an RAF mechanic in World War Two and among the first to land in France in 1944, said the new facilities as "excellent" and praised the "kindness" of the staff at the home.

The home's chief executive Karen Miller said the rebuild, which included the addition of a specialist gym, a hairdressing and barber's salon, and a restaurant and bar, had made the home "fit for the 21st Century".

"We are now able offer a vital trilogy of services to the region's veteran community - nursing, residential and dementia care, outreach support and independent living," she said.

She added the home would provide veterans "with the level of comfort and support that they very much need and deserve".