Selly Oak Constituency Nursery provision under threat

I am determined to work with parents to fight council cuts and incompetence which are putting nursery places in the area at risk.

Three nurseries in the constituency are currently fighting for their survival: Selly Oak Nursery School (one of the oldest in the city), Reameadow Children’s Day Nursery (Stirchley) and Millpool Gardens (Druids Heath). Between them they look after 140 local children.

Reameadow and Millpool Gardens are both local authority run community day nurseries. Staff at both these nurseries have been issued with redundancy notices and warned not to speak to the press. This is part of council cost cutting measures which will see 2000 jobs go across the council.

The financially struggling independent, voluntary aided Selly Oak Nursery School has been arguing that it should be run as a charity trust under the education authority, just as faith schools are. The nursery has already spent £4,500 of its funds working with officers of the city council to this end only for the council to now claim the Charity Commission won’t allow it yet the Charity Commission disputes this. Currently the nursery is primarily funded through donations. It is not allowed to become a private nursery because of the conditions laid down by George Cadbury in 1904 when the nursery school was set up. The council has refused to guarantee its long term future.

In my view removing 140 places from local parents who need nursery education for their children is very significant and could make things really difficult for a number of working parents.

I find this staggeringly irresponsible. We already know, as a result of the council’s own research, that there is an unmet demand for childcare – particularly in provision for the under fives. Selly Oak constituency is in fact one of the areas where parents are most likely to have trouble finding appropriate day nursery care places for their children, yet the council has written to Selly Oak Nursery stating that their places are surplus to requirement.

The Council has a duty under the 2006 Childcare Act to ensure that the provision of childcare is sufficient to meet parental demands. It is clear that the demand is currently not being met which means that the Council’s Chief Executive has some explaining to do. I have written to ask for an assurance that these places will be protected.

The report can be found here.