CAMPAIGNERS are set to protest ahead of a crunch meeting over a controversial respite centre in Southampton.

Carers are set to meet up outside the civic centre in the city ahead of an extraordinary governance committee meeting set to start at 5pm today, when civic chiefs will discuss the findings of investigations into the way Southampton City Council dealt with the closure of Kentish Road Respite Centre.

As reported, reviews published ahead of the meeting found a number of failings into the way the closure of the centre was dealt with and carers are set to receive £40,000 compensation.

But they said their fight is not over yet and they are set to demand a “more generous compensation” and call for staff members responsible for the failings to resign.

Investigations into the way the council dealt with the closure of the Shirley centre showed faults in care assessments, carers assessments review and poor communication between council staff, councillors, carers and service users.

The reports acknowledge that the council has acted on the recommendation that watchdogs made .

But the documents have sparked calls for those responsible for the failings to resign.

Campaigner Amanda Guest said staff council responsible for the failings are still employed by the authority and she is calling for them to resign with immediate effect.

The council did not confirm whether those responsible are still council employees and when asked if any action will be taken , the authority said it was unable to comment until the governance committee had met.

SCC council leader Christopher Hammond said mistakes were made and closing the centre was “not the council’s finest hour”. He also highlighted how improvements have been made and will be made in the future.

Kentish Road Respite Centre supports people living with a learning disability and their carers. Its closure was proposed in 2014 and delayed until November 2017.

The partial-reopening of the centre was announced last year and was the first major move of councillor  Hammond’s tenure as leader.

The centre is set to reopen full-time in July.