Nurseries held in the dark over key funding decisions

A new survey has revealed that over a third of Maintained Nursery Schools are cutting staffing and services to balance their books because of lost income and extra coronavirus-related costs.

Exacerbated with a lack of certainty within the funding they will receive from spring 2022, Maintained Nursery School leaders reported losing typically over £70,000 of revenue, as well as having to invest an additional £8,000 for further costs.

Unlike another schools, Maintained Nursery Schools were not entitled to exceptional cost funding for Covid from government and so have had to deal with the brunt of these costs themselves. They were also not eligible for some government schemes which benefited private providers in the sector such as the business rates holiday or loans.

The survey, carried out by Early Education, NAHT, NEU and UNISON, implies that 46 per cent of respondents asserted after March 2021, they'd maintain deficit for the year. The average deficit reported was £76,000. Worryingly, only 23 per cent of respondents confirmed they could still operate inside their current funding levels and 21 percent reported they have financial recovery plans in position or under discussion.

Paul Whiteman, general secretary of school leaders’ union NAHT, said: “We all know that lots of Maintained Nursery Schools were already in a perilous financial position entering the pandemic. Recent times only has deepened that crisis. As to prevent widespread closures of these nurseries, the federal government needs to come forward with a long-term solution – this could can't be kicked in the future any more.”

Beatrice Merrick, leader of Early Education, said: “Maintained nursery schools during the pandemic were a lifeline for local families: they stayed open which are more vulnerable children and children of critical workers, often taking in children from other settings which closed.  They supported their own families with remote learning – and frequently with food parcels and practical support.  These were in touch with vulnerable families when health insurance and social services were not able maintain contact.  Rather than this lifeline being supported, it's being put at risk by government failure to deal with their routine funding needs.  Being operating on the financial knife-edge for years, the pandemic has tipped the total amount for a lot of schools, government needs to take action now to resolve the long-term funding issue and supply targeted financial aid to those whose survival has been jeopardised by the pandemic.”