The following guest post from Malcolm Fearn, Chairman of Oxfordshire Parenting Forum was published in The Oxford Mail/ Oxford Times Letters Section.
The consultation on closing the 44 children’s centres and seven early intervention hubs in Oxfordshire has now commenced.
The only options proposed by the county council are to replace all of them with just six or eight centres across Oxfordshire and this is clearly totally unacceptable.
There does not appear to be any attempt to consider the value, but just a desire for short term savings.
Yes, the county council has to achieve savings, but surely not at the expense of the future of our children.
Money spent on children pays continuing dividends as they move through life.
Giving children the best possible start in life means that in later life they are less involved with health services, social care, mental health services, criminal courts, probation and prisons.
This means significant savings for years to come.
Children’s centres play an important part in ensuring parents can easily access those services which are most appropriate for them, and meet other parents in a relaxed setting.
The county council is not suggesting that children’s centres are failing, just that they are not prepared to fund them.
Right next to us in Buckinghamshire, they have decided they can achieve the necessary savings without closing one children’s centre, never mind the wholesale closures proposed for Oxfordshire.
The proposed reductions will leave large parts of rural Oxfordshire with no access to the range of services that a children’s centre can provide, as well as severely limiting access in the towns.
So please take part in the consultation, attend the public meetings and tell our local councillors that you do not accept any of the options that they propose.
Ask them to reconsider their priorities and not to make the swingeing cuts to the children’s centre budget.
Malcolm Fearn
Oxfordshire Parenting Forum Chairman.
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