Plans to close Croftamie Nursery are set to come before councillors this week.
Stirling Council’s children and young people committee is considering whether to start a formal consultation on possible permanent closure of the nursery by summer 2020.
Under the plans, children at Croftamie would be moved to a new build nursery at Drymen Primary School.
The facility, which looks after up to 32 pre–school children from the age of two, received a glowing report from inspectors last September. It was rated as ‘excellent’ in its quality of care and support and its quality of management and leadership as ‘very good’, following an unannounced visit last July.
However, a recent review established that the building may not meet the requirements for the expansion of free early learning and childcare, due to be delivered in phases across Stirling by August 2020.
The Scottish Government is expanding nursery education from next year. Parents in Scotland will be entitled to 1140 hours of nursery provision per year for their children. The funding will follow the child, so parents will have a choice whether to make use of council–run nurseries, private nurseries, or even a mixture. If they need more than 1140 hours they can opt to pay for them.
Because of the new requirements, some nurseries require infrastructure changes to their buildings to allow them to accommodate the numbers of children and the longer timescales.
In a report due before the committee on Thursday, officials said the Croftamie building itself was in good condition but would not be large enough to accommodate the new arrangements.
“Achievable” works to the existing building and grounds would cost around £550,000, however would still not fully meet the requirements.
A new build nursery in Croftamie which did meet all needs would cost an estimated £1.058million, assuming that privately owned land could be acquired.
Officers’ preferred option therefore is to build a new nursery in the grounds of Drymen Primary School. As the land is owned by the council there would be no extra acquisition costs and the project would therefore cost £868,000.
They do not expect any revenue savings for the council as a result of the closure as any spend would be transferred to the new nursery, however it could make money if it decides to sell the building.
If the committee agrees to start the public consultation process this would run from April 26 until June 2019 during which time a public meeting would take place and HM Inspectors would also consider their views on the proposal. A report would then go back to the CYP committee in September for a decision on the closure.
The report added: “Although there may be options for alternative sites in Croftamie for a new build nursery, the additional, unbudgeted costs of land acquisition is not affordable from the Scottish Government’s 1140 grant funding allocation and would require to be funded by council in 2019/20.
“A new build nursery at Drymen Primary is affordable within the overall 1140 programme grant funding allocation of £7million.
“The challenging delivery programme for the expansion of early learning and childcare would be at risk if land acquisition has to be factored into the programme; a suitable site which does not detrimentally impact upon on the land take required for school use is already available at Drymen Primary and, subject to approval, construction can begin in late 2019.”
