CHARITY workers have accused councillors of letting down carers after their organisation was left facing financial ruin.

Oxford Carers Centre has threatened to take Oxfordshire County Council to the Local Government Ombudsman after it was stripped of its funding to give support and advice to thousands of people looking after elderly relatives.

The centre is still paying rent on its Cowley Road premises, and has warned its remaining services, including Young Carers, who support youngsters who look after ill parents, could fold.

The Oxford Mail has learned trustees last month wrote to council chairman Patrick Greene, accusing County Hall of “serious maladministration” in the way it restructured the support it offers carers. The council estimates 60,000 people care for spouses, siblings, elderly parents or disabled children around the county, but just 9,000 have been identified to the authorities.

The Cowley Road centre offered a drop-in centre and organised respite for carers. Similar charities ran centres in Didcot and Banbury.

The council launched a restructuring in 2009, and Age UK won the contract to provide a countywide service.

The Carers Oxfordshire customer services centre and call line, supported by outreach officers and support workers, opened in April in Abingdon.

It provides advice over the telephone but no drop-in service. However workers do go out into the community.

But Oxford Carers Centre said clients felt “betrayed” by the move. Acting chairman Mattie Jefferies said: “We had built up a really good carers’ centre in Oxford.

“People knew us, could come to us and sit and talk. They can relate to somebody in person, but not to an anonymous voice at a call centre.”

She said during the tendering process, the council had cancelled meetings, changed policies abruptly and delayed decision making, leaving the centre with demoralised staff and rent to pay on a property it no longer needed.

The trustees’ letter said: “A county council with a budget larger than many of the United Nations’ member states can perhaps afford such discourtesy, wasteful extravagance and disregard for staff morale.

“Small charitable organisations like ours cannot do so.”

The council said it was treating the centre’s letter as a formal complaint and investigating the issues in detail.

Spokesman Marcus Mabberley said: “The council’s new adult carers’ strategy is based around the idea of reaching and assisting many more carers in Oxfordshire.

“It simply isn’t true to say that there is currently ‘no face-to-face’ contact.”