Last ditch attempt to save nursery

A LAST ditch attempt is made to win more time to save Warrington’s popular Westy Sure Start day nursery.
Two Latchford councillors – Hans Mundry and Steve Wright – are putting a motion to next week’s meeting of the borough council calling for talks with local parents and the community to explore all available alternatives to the closure of the nursery at the end of March.
They also want the council to fund the nursery until the end of June, to give more time to find all possible options.
The council has already failed twice to find a third party provider to run the facilility.
Currently the only registered full day-care provider managed by the council, the nursery on Reynolds Street has fallen victim to spending cutbacks.
Although there were some initial expressions of interest from operators, no formal applications to run the facility were received.
More recently detailed conversations were held with one specific provider but unfortunately they were unable to progress the opportunity due to unexpected reductions in their own budget.
Staff are currently being consulted and it is hoped alternative roles can be found for many of them elsewhere in the council’s children and young people’s services.
Parents will be supported by the council’s families information service who will help them look at their needs and the suitable alternatives – currently about a third of the children attending Westy do not live in the immediate area.
When the nursery first opened in 2004 it ran on grants and funding from central government. But in 2007 this money was withdrawn and since then the council have have subsidised the facility. Now, however, they say they can no longer afford to do so.