A decision on proposals to change the delivery of Southampton City Council’s overnight respite provision for adults with learning disabilities has been postponed.

Following concerns by the families of service users and existing external providers, cabinet members agreed to hold a further consultation.

Cabinet member for adults and health Cllr Marie Finn said the council will explore the viability of the whole of adult respite going externally as opposed to internally.

She said the local authority will ensure that all of those who would be impacted are consulted on their views about who provides services.

A report to cabinet had recommended introducing a model where the council would run the service at Kentish Road in Shirley and Weston Court in Weston.

The local authority already runs Kentish Road, while Weston Court is currently delivered by external provider Way Ahead Leisure Pursuits.

This proposal would also have seen some users of charity-run Rose Road transferred to Kentish Road, which would be expanded.

However, following a recommendation from overview and scrutiny management committee, Cllr Finn set out a plan to pause the decision.

At the cabinet meeting on Tuesday, January 28, Cllr Finn said: “Taking into account that I absolutely want to respect the views of scrutiny panel and at the same time I don’t want to take months over decisions for everybody’s wellbeing, I am suggesting the following.

“That we will defer the decision and then we will undertake a four-week public consultation to gather views about respite being offered by the council or external providers.

“While this is happening officers can gather details from external providers about the viability of providing more respite externally as requested by the scrutiny panel.”

Cllr Finn said she remained concerned about the risk to the council from not running any of the service in-house but she accepted that the scrutiny committee wanted all options considered.

The cabinet member said deferring the decision prolonged the period of uncertainty for carers and delayed the time it would take to make savings, which was one of the main aims of the project, along with expanding capacity, maintaining quality and not reducing bed nights.

She said carers had different views and she did not want people to be set up in opposition to each other.

Conservative group leader Cllr Peter Baillie said consultation was a “sensitive subject” at the moment, given a decision on car parking charges went against 98 per cent of responses who opposed the proposal.

He said: “What assurance can you give people who undertake the consultation that you will actually listen to what they say because if 98 per cent of people weren’t listened to in the paper coming up, that doesn’t bode well for people in the consultation for the one you are just about to do.”

Council leader Cllr Lorna Fielker said everybody was listened to but consultations were not referendums.

“We as a cabinet decide on what we feel is the right and best decision for the council based on the information we have,” Cllr Fielker said.

“The consultation response is part of that suite of information, not the single piece of information which is relied upon.

“If we had no interest in hearing those views then we wouldn’t bother and we would be going ahead and making a decision now.

“The fact that we are going out for a further four weeks does show that we are willing to listen and explore what people’s appetite is.”

Cllr Finn said the consultation is not likely to start until at least the end of next week meaning the earliest a report could come back to cabinet would be in March.