A HANDYMAN service for elderly and vulnerable residents in Blaenau Gwent will see £25,000 in council funding withdrawn from next year.

Councillors agreed to stop funding Care and Repair while a review into the independent home improvement agency is undertaken.

Blaenau Gwent council intends to keep the service, which they say meets a ‘service gap’ in the borough due to the lack of private firms willing to take on small-scale jobs.

But the authority wants to strengthen Care and Repair’s contract management and revisit the age criteria for support, while also proposing to explore alternative funding streams.

Funding will be withdrawn from the service from April 1, 2019.

At a meeting on Wednesday, council leader Councillor Nigel Daniels said: “There’s a specific need for the handyman service in Blaenau Gwent.

“But while we’re accepting the value of that service, there is the opportunity to take a wider view of the service alongside other elements of Care and Repair.

“We’ve had assurances that if we remove this £25,000, it will not have a detrimental effect on the service, and it will help us.”

For the year to June 30, there were 108 handyman jobs completed with 82 per cent of clients between 70 and 80 years old, and 42 per cent aged 80 and above.

The service currently costs £10.80 per half hour for people over 65 and £13.80 per half hour for those under 65.

The council covers the payroll for the service and its 20 employees, with jobs taking on average one day per month to complete – costing the authority around £2,000 per year.

Care and Repair is also contracted to carry out jobs for social services through the Safety at Home programme.

The contract, valued at £110,000, sees the service carry out adaptations to an individual’s home to allow them to remain living independently in the community and to support hospital discharge.

Blaenau Gwent social services will carry out the review of both the Safety at Home and handyman service in a bid to find efficiencies across both contracts.

Care and Repair, a registered charity, once operated in Caerphilly before the council also withdrew its funding.

But according to a report, there are plans to relaunch the scheme in the neighbouring authority subject to funding being secured.