An office block belonging to a council could be turned into a care home.

Kent County Council has declared the building at No 50 Gibson Drive, Kings Hill, to be surplus to requirement, and Aspire LLP is seeking planning permission to demolish the building and replace it with a Y-shaped 78-bed care home to cater for those with high dependancy, and for some with dementia.

The building was once used as a laboratory by Sekisia Diagnostics, but has been vacant for six years, aside from KCC using it to store surplus furniture.

Aspire envisages a three-storey building but says it will be no higher than the existing two-storey block.

The new home will keep the same vehicle access off Warwick Way and most of the existing landscaping.

However, the number of car parking spaces on the 1.2 acre site will be reduced from 51 to 22, including two disabled bays, plus a bay for delivery vans and one for emergency ambulances.

Each of the bedrooms will have an ensuite wet-room and there will be a hair salon and cafe.

The company expects most of the residents to come from the local area, where it has ascertained that there is a shortfall of care places. It will be Kings Hill’s first care home.

Aspire says that because many of the residents will already be on local GPs’ registers, there will not be an increased demand for GP services.

Instead, it maintains that having suitable accommodation for those becoming frail or ill will lessen the frequency of accidents in the home and so reduce pressure on the NHS, and it will also reduce the phenomenon of bed-blocking in local hospitals.

The company estimates that once up and running the care home will create the equivalent of 26 full-time jobs for care and ancilliary staff.

The site falls within an area reserved for employment use in the Local Plan, but the company argues that the “critical” need for care places outweighs that concern.

The application can be viewed on the Tonbridge and Malling council website here.

Application number 23/00859 refers.