A SOUTHAMPTON care home at the centre of neglect allegations took on new residents even when their families couldn’t afford the fees, a court heard.

The owner of the Briars Retirement Home in Bitterne admitted that elderly residents were sometimes given the go-ahead to move in regardless of whether their loved ones could pay for a “top up” fee.

Giving evidence at Southampton Crown Court, Annette Hopkins, said families would usually enter in to negotiations over the extra care fee, which supplemented normal state funding.

But when asked what happened when hard-up families were keen for their parents to be housed there, she told jurors: “I still had them at the Briars.

“I was always brought up to think that money was not everything in this world and when someone said this is where they want their parent to be, we would try not to do a top up.”

Fighting back tears, Hopkins went on to outline how the home had purchased one elderly resident a chair fitted with an electronic lifting mechanism at no charge to the family.

And when the woman left the home, the apparatus went with her, the court was told.

“I asked them (the family) to take it with her because it was her chair,” added the 64- year-old.

The prosecution claims residents of the home were left in urine-soaked beds, several suffered bed sores and ulcers, and others were so ill they should have been in nursing homes.

They claimed Hopkins, of Thorold Road, Southampton and manager Margaret Priest failed to adhere to basic standard of care and practice.

The home was closed down in September, 2008 after health professionals and police were granted an emergency court order.

Hopkins and Priest, 56, of Lydgate Green, Hightown, deny charges of wilful neglect and ill treatment of residents in their care.