Complex negotiations between World Jewish Relief and Manchester’s Morris Fienmann care home have paved the way for an £11 million new elderly care development.

The land in Didsbury, south Manchester, was subject to historic covenants which promised a third of proceeds from a land sale to WJR and the Otto Schiff Housing Association, which helped fund the opening of the home in the 1950s.

Now a deal which saw an unspecified donation made to WJR has facilited an agreement to allow a non-Jewish care home developer to build a 72-bed home on the site of Morris Feinmann’s now closed Victorian property.
The home was closed in June to allow for the development with 44 residents moving to kosher facilities in a non-Jewish care home near Altrincham, a few miles away.

CLS Belong, which runs 30 homes across the north west, will now apply for planning permission for a care village and 11 sheltered housing apartments which will include a kosher kitchen, a cafeteria, lounges, space for Shabbat and festival services, a gym, spa room, hairdressing salon and meeting rooms.

Alan Wilkins, chair of the Morris Fienmann Home Trust, said the deal “is an exciting development that will provide the growing south Manchester Jewish community with the very best Jewish care in the UK”.