Mothers from across England have handed Downing Street a 50,000-name petition against the proposed cuts to Sure Start Children's Centres.
See the full story here.
As a parent are you concerned about these proposed cuts? I used the Sure Start Centres an awful lot during my maternity leave after the birth of my first child and found the support and friendship there invaluable. Have you used them and will you miss it if your local centre goes?
Maxine (member of the Platform team)
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Mothers from across England have handed Downing Street a 50,000-name petition against the proposed cuts to Sure Start Children's Centres.
See the full story here.
As a parent are you concerned about these proposed cuts? I used the Sure Start Centres an awful lot during my maternity leave after the birth of my first child and found the support and ...
Comments
I am not one to usually 'shout' on political issues; like many, I just keep my head down.
This one, though, is a whole different kettle of fish. I rely so much on my local Sure Start centre. I am a teacher in a secondary school and due to having no other form of support (I am a single parent) I need this service to ensure my life keeps ticking. My youngest is too young to be able to walk upto my school as he is still in nursery.
The idea of cutting this service is just insane. I understand that that some of the services are deemed that they would run without the facility of the Government providing the building, however, the alternative day care is simply not a good option! I live in a small rural Norfolk town; child minders locally have decided, en mass, they will all have Fridays off and they vary their prices, according to what you do for a job!
The Sure Start centre is a place that offers a secure, uninterrupted option of care for our little people and allows me to hold my head up high as a working single parent.
If only these politicians saw the big picture of such a sweeping action.
I completely agree with you, Sarah.
The amount of Sure Start centres threatened with closure is absolutely insane. I completely understand cuts need to be made, but why on Earth such a huge chunk of this has to be from children's services and education, I have no idea. Perhaps the PM and his cronies should take a pay cut and the extra funds could be funelled into much needed and used community sevices.
We were lucky - our most used centre, once threatened with closure, managed to find someone to run it independently. It's meant a rise in the cost of activities and sessions; but at least we still have our much loved group to go to.