STAFF at a retirement home complex are working for new bosses after their company was snapped up by a healthcare giant.

About 160 workers at Richmond Care Villages complex at Letcombe Regis, near Wantage, have been assured their jobs are safe following the takeover by BUPA for an undisclosed sum.

BUPA management have also confirmed that plans to develop a new site in Witney which will create a similar number of jobs, will go ahead.

Richmond Care Villages marketing manager David Reaves said: “This was a shareholder decision and not a hostile takeover. BUPA has given assurances that everyone’s job is safe.

“They are buying our expertise in the village care sector and the management team will continue.”

Mr Reaves added that BUPA bosses were “fully behind” the development of a new Witney site, which could create 150 jobs by 2015.

“As a company we are over the moon as BUPA has the funds to back what we want to do,” he said.

Planning permission for the new £45m development at Coral Springs, Thorney Leys, has been secured, with the complex set to include 60 bedrooms, 46 care suites and 79 apartments with building work due to start by the end of the year.

The facility will have the appearance of a small village and include a shop, cafe, library, beauty salon, restaurant, bowling green, spa and fitness studio.

The 12-acre Letcombe Regis site, home to 200 residents, started operating in 2010 and a further phase was opened last autumn. It now has 72 apartments, 60 separate assisted living apartments and a 53-bed care home offering nursing and dementia care.

The deal saw Bupa buy all five Richmond Villages developments across England with 600 staff transferring.

Andrew Cannon, managing director of Bupa Care Services, said: “This acquisition underlines Bupa’s strategy to offer older people a wider choice and expand the range of services that we provide beyond care homes.

“Richmond is an excellent company, with great people, and good locations, that will help us meet these ambitions.”

Bupa also manages a number of independent-living and assisted-living properties in the UK through its Goldsborough Estates business.

Bupa Care Services employs 27,000 people, and looks after 18,500 residents across the UK.