RELATIVES of 19 people who died at a care home have made fresh calls for an inquiry into their deaths.

Previous calls for a public inquiry into the deaths at Orchid View care home in Copthorne, near Crawley, have failed and the relatives have now spoken with MPs to call for a full hearing.

The request came during a meeting attended by concerned relatives, West Sussex MPs and Louise Goldsmith, leader of West Sussex County Council, on Friday.

Judith Charatan, from the Orchid View Relatives’ Action Group, said: “We don’t think the problems have gone away.

“We felt the council attempted to act on recommendations from the serious case review, but we are still getting incidents at a national and a local level of neglect and abuse.”

Ms Charatan, whose mother Doris Fielding died at the care home, added that the relatives would like MPs to take on board their renewed request for an inquiry and they are also calling for a review of national social care management.

Orchid View, which was run by Southern Cross, shut in 2011 and an inquest into the 19 deaths came to a close two years later.

Five of the residents who died at the care home were found to have suffered neglect.

The fresh calls for an inquiry were made as Sussex Police continue to investigate the care received by residents at nine Sussex Health Care homes, after 12 of them died.

The county council outlined its new initiative to MPs at the meeting, Enough Is Enough, It’s Time To Care, which addresses the authority’s work lobbying the Government ahead of its green paper on social care.

Louise Goldsmith, leader of West Sussex County Council, said: “The meeting with local MPs and relatives from Orchid View about issues around care was very productive.

“Our whole aim is to get care raised at a national level and to see changes made to the sector so we stop seeing repeated headlines about failings in care.

“We will continue to push for changes and for the issue to be raised nationally.

“Enough is enough – it’s time to care.”

The MPs who attended Friday’s meeting were Sir Peter Bottomley, MP for Worthing, Arundel and South Downs MP Nick Herbert, Chichester MP Gillian Keegan, Tim Loughton, MP for East Worthing and Shoreham, and Jeremy Quin, MP for Horsham.

A county council spokeswoman said apologies were received in advance of the meeting last week from MPs who were not able to attend.