A council boss has defended controversial plans to privatise carers’ jobs.

Simon Williams, Merton’s director of housing and communities, dismissed accusations the level of care would suffer from privatisation as “misleading” and not backed up by the facts.

Carers are angry that around 80 jobs are being transferred to private employers as the council’s in-house team stops providing long-term care and focuses entirely on a “reablement” programme of short-term care.

Many have claimed that the privatisation will lead to worse conditions for carers and, ultimately, a poorer service for residents.

Mr Williams accepted that “terms and conditions for carers working for the council are more generous than in the private sector”, and that there was significant unrest among carers about the changes.

But he said that moving to private agencies, which already provide about 60 per cent of care for the borough, would not affect the level of service for Merton’s residents.

He added: “I couldn’t accept the claim that the private system provides a poor service.”

Mr Williams also rejected claims by union Unison that there had been inadequate consultation with carers about the changes, which will see around 50 carers assigned to the reablement service while the remaining 80 have their contracts taken on by private agencies.

He said the council had begun consultations with staff last autumn and had kept them as informed as possible while the new scheme was being developed.

The move to a reablement service, which the council say is backed up by current research and the Government’s best practice guidelines, is set to take place in the coming months.

Carers will spend six to 10 weeks with clients, encouraging them to gain confidence and perform as many everyday tasks for themselves as possible.

Mr Williams said that focusing on reablement was the best use of the council’s resources.

He added that the scheme would save the council around £125,000 a year - but claimed the decision had been taken to improve the quality of care rather than to cut costs.

In a letter attacking the changes, Unison Merton branch secretary Rosemary McLoughlin said: “The council has never valued the commitment of Merton’s home care staff.”

She also attacked the decision not to consult service users and claimed the proposals for the reablement team were “vague” and “ambiguous”.