Children's Centres closing- is this true....??

[ladypanda]

Hi,

Does anyone know if there's any truth in the rumours that the Tories plan to drastically cut the number of Sure Start/ Children's centres if they get in? I just read a blog that said this was true, and that Labour are coming out against it on Tuesday. Over my dead body- my little one LOVES his and so do we!
Just wanted to sound others out before I go on my own personal protest march.....

x

Someone should bring out a credit crunch edition of Sim City!

I'm rather worried about this too, because dd2 attends nursery at the Sure Start centre attached to my dd1's school.

I did once e-mail our Tory candidate about this and he said it wouldn't be closed, but who should I believe?

Ours is very much used by lower-income families with a few better off families but we are all parents bringing up small children and surely it is better for people on different incomes to mix a bit?

The people who attend my local centres, in quite a poor area, vary a lot, but at many, there's a real mix of backgrounds. The one that does best I think at attracting poorer families is actually the one nearest my house.

They do that by having stay and play drop ins which are open to everybody - there are also English classes and job finding advice, and all sorts of stuff.

I will sign up for the Save Our Surestart tonight.

OK, I'm not from a very deprived background. But I think that my difficulties with feeding and postnatal depression would have been potentially a lot more problematic for my babies and/or much more expensive to treat if I hadn't been able to get out of the house every day to take my babies somewhere.