A group campaigning to save five council-run nurseries in Salford has joined up with campaigners from across the country at a rally in Salford
The five nurseries in Salford are all rated outstanding by Ofsted, but were threatened with closure earlier this year when government cuts removed their funding.
UNISON members, staff, and parents have all been campaigning to keep them open. In response to the campaign, Salford mayor Paul Dennett agreed to find a further £1.5m to keep them open until at least August 2019. However, there are no guarantees of their future beyond that date.
Nursery staff address the rally
A rally held on 27 October outside Salford Civic Centre was attended by Angela Rayner, Labour’s shadow of secretary of state for education and herself a former UNISON convenor.
She said: “I was given those opportunities through the local authority and through the state maintained nursery that I attended, and I think that every single child deserves that opportunity.”
Other council-run nurseries are facing similar threats and, at the rally, Salford campaigners met representatives from Tower Hamlets and Nottingham, and and now intend to build a national campaign to save nurseries from threatened closures.
