Schools plan to save threatened nurseries

FIVE Salford day nurseries under threat of closure could be saved by letting schools run them.

They care for some of the most deprived children in the city, but in February parents and staff were told the facilities were scheduled to close this month - with the loss of 100 jobs.

The council-run nurseries that could shut are Little Hulton Day Nursery, Winton Day Nursery, Barton Moss Day Nursery, Belvedere Day Nursery and Higher Broughton Day Nursery.

After first announcing they were to close, Salford council then decided to reprieve the five until September 2019.

Now it is to start consultation on plans to base the nurseries in schools and so save them from closure. A 30-day consultation is being launched on Friday for the public to give their views on proposals.

Councillor Lisa Stone, lead member for children’s and young people’s services at the council, said: “We are now consulting on a proposal to retain the outstanding nursery provision in the city.

“We would like to consult on how local authority nurseries would be managed and operated by school provision in the city. And we need a conversation with residents to seek their views on this.

“The passion from residents is clear and the nursery provision provided by the staff who work in them is outstanding, so we need to explore all options and explore the detail of how this would work using school provision.” A total of 327 places are offered in the local authority nurseries out of 4,234 in a variety of early years providers. Over 2,000 of these places are available through schools in the city. Coun Stone added: “We have already given a commitment to fund our five local authority nurseries to September, 2019. But changes by the government on the way the Dedicated Schools Grant can be used mean the Coun Lisa Stone council can no longer afford the running costs of its nurseries.

“They cost £3m each year to run but the council only receives £1.5m in income from charges.

“Seven years of austerity have cut our core funding in half. That works out at £198m since 2010 – or £60,000 out of our budget each and every day.”

The consultation will involve public meetings and also options for people to provide comments by post or online.

It can be viewed at salford.gov. uk/nurseryproposal.

Consultation meetings, which are all from 6pm to 7pm will take place tonight at Barton Moss Day Nursery, September 13 at Winton Day Nursery, September 18 at Belvedere Day Nursery, September 20 at Little Hulton Day Nursery and September 26 at Broughton Day Nursery