MORE than six months since Bournemouth council approved plans to buy a new care home the deal has still yet to be completed.

Cabinet members of the now-abolished council gave the “urgent” go-ahead for the purchase of the 67-bed facility which it said would save it as much as £400,000 a year in reduced costs.

However, the deal has still yet to be finalised, despite an initial estimate that it would be done at the beginning of the year.

Neither Bournemouth council nor its successor BCP Council has revealed which care home is the subject of the negotiation nor how much it will have to pay.

But a report published ahead of the deal being supported said it would be cheaper than the estimated £7-8 million cost of the council building one.

It said that owning its own facilities reduced costs compared to paying private providers would save it £400,000 annually.

Speaking at the time, former Bournemouth council cabinet member for adult social care, Blair Crawford, said there was “an urgent need” for more affordable beds in the borough.

He said that officers had been working on the "complex" deal for a year before it was given the approval of cabinet members.

A spokesman for BCP Council said that the purchase had yet to be completed and that it would make an announcement once it had.