MOST residents of old people's homes have no more rights than guests at a hotel, it has been revealed.

Amidst a national crisis in the care home industry, the Daily Echo this week launched its Homes Guard campaign to give victims of closures at least two months' notice.

Although most social services contracts currently state homes must give 28 days' notice of closure, the law does not say residents must receive any notice at all.

"They're vulnerable people and yet their tenancy rights are no stronger than someone staying in a hotel or bed and breakfast," said John Rynne, head of adult social services at Bournemouth Borough Council.

The Echo has been deluged with calls from residential care and nursing home owners about the crisis in the industry.

They complain about red tape, extra regulations and low fees for taking social services clients.

Russell Wilson, chairman of the Registered Nursing Homes Association in Dorset, said the crisis had been predictable for the last 15 years.

He said the crisis would worsen when regulations on standards for shared rooms came into force in 2002. "Home closures haven't even started yet," he said.

Jean Hooker, proprietor of Christie Lodge in King's Park, said: "We would never have been in this crisis if we hadn't been asked by the government and also by the local authorities for so much paperwork.

"The time we are spending on that is not leaving us the time to do the job we are supposed to be doing and that's caring for the elderly."

Richard Chaumoo, proprietor of Brooke House in Christchurch, expects to close the home within two years as new regulations are introduced.

"A lot of nurses in the businesses left the health service because of bureaucracy and paperwork and that's what's happening in the care home industry now," he said.

"All you do is paperwork, paperwork, paperwork and you're detached from the real issues.

"Morale is low, job satisfaction is non-existent and I don't think anybody who's departed from the care home industry will ever go back into it."