Nursery schools face axe

The council is to launch a public consultation into proposals to close High School Yards and Princess Elizabeth nurseries if the plans are approved by the education committee at a meeting on 12 October.

The SNP/Lib Dem-led council says that both nurseries are significantly under capacity and that children can be accommodated at other city nursery schools. It plans to sell the nursery buildings for an estimated £250,000, which it says would be reinvested in the children and families department.

Marilyne MacLaren, Edinburgh Council's education leader, said, 'We are completely committed to early years and nursery provision to ensure that Edinburgh's children get the best possible start in life. However, our extremely challenging financial situation means that we must ensure that the services we provide are efficient and effectively targeted. We have a good spread of nurseries across the city, but in some areas there are more than we need. These empty places cost a lot of money.'

Andrew Burns, the council Labour leader, said that the council had approved cuts of £302,000 to nursery school provision in February and that it had refused to confirm which settings were facing the axe. 'For seven months they have refused to come clean and say what their proposals were,' he said. 'Now, via a general press release, they say they are going to close two nursery schools with a saving of some £200,000. It is an appalling way to treat parents, families and children and shows no respect for the very serious concerns this will raise for many, many families in the city.

'The Lib Dems and SNP urgently need to show some honesty and tell parents how they are going to make the further £102,000 of cuts in nursery school provision that they approved.'

In a letter to the Edinburgh Evening News last week, local resident CJR Fentiman pointed out that the council is meanwhile spending £230,000 on a set of traffic lights. 'Since when were traffic lights more important than nurseries?' the letter said.