To think children’s centers should be open to all?

[Newmummy201919]

Just that really. I’m in London and there’s a children’s centre quite near me that I’ve just discovered. It’s lovely, warm, well attended, and a few minutes walk from my home, same post code. However, it belongs to a different neighbouring borough (though for some reason physically in my borough). I attended yesterday with DD for the first time and was told we could not use the services (stay and play) as we are not residents. AIBU to think we should be allowed to atttedn? As more children’s centres are closing I’d think they’d be keen to have the attendance.

They'll have some kind of restrictive funding that only allows them to be paid for providing services to that Borough.
I used to work in a Cab that was right on the dividing line between boroughs and was forever having to turn people away for living on the wrong side of the street.
It's crappy. I agree provision should be better. Were they able to signpost you to anything similar in your own Borough?

It's going back about 5 years but the one near me used to prioritise those people for who it was their nearest centre. So you could only attend the activity if it didn't fill up with the 'locals' was same Borough though.

In my city centres are only for targeted intervention, so you might live beside one but never have been in one. In many ways it makes sense, in times of austerity it ensures that families who require the most support get it.

But it's funded by another borough for use by their residents. I get their point.

They used to be open to all. Unfortunately the cuts mean there are less centres open and less activities running so places are being selective about who can come. I suspect they usually fill up with people from that borough. Odd though when it is in your Borough geographically.

At our local centre, you have to be queueing at least 10 mins before the session starts, so inevitably this skews the demographic attending.