THE opening date for a new council-run children’s home in Monmouth has been pushed back again by up to three months.

Approval to buy and convert the four-bedroom house in the Dixton area was given by Monmouthshire Council’s cabinet in March 2024, and although it was originally intended to open by December, the launch date was pushed back to April 2025.

But councillors have now been told the earliest date for works to be completed is June 30, although the council’s children’s services department is “pressing for this to be brought forward”.

Council residential service manager Scott Hereford said problems had been discovered after work started on the property, which the council had bought, with grant funding, for £795,000 in March 2024.

“Until you start taking plaster off the walls and doors off you don’t know what’s underneath,” Mr Hereford told the council’s performance and overview scutiny committee, but said it had also carried out detailed surveys.

Mr Hereford said the service, which is also establishing a four-bedroom children’s in Caldicot, which isn’t expected to open until December, and is looking for a further property in north Monmouthshire, will learn to take account of potential delays.

Refurbishment works eventually started in January and the council has appointed staff to run and manage the county’s first council-run children’s home – the location of which hasn’t been revealed publicly, but reportedly in the Dixton area according to neighbours who have been notified – with training to run from May.

The council is establishing its own in-house provision to try and meet the rising costs of social care placements and in response to the Welsh Government’s “eliminate agenda”, which is to remove profit from children’s care.

Four children currently placed in out of county “for profit” placements will be offered places in Monmouth and the council says “transition planning” has begun with “careful consideration of the potential for a change in service opening date”.