Hillingdon Council in Greater London has said that future plans for a children's centre programme will be decided at Hillingdon Council's Cabinet meeting on Thursday, 16 March.
Following a recent public consultation on a new model for the delivery of Hillingdon's children's centre programme, the final decision on the future provision of services will be made this week.
The council will assume management of all children's centres in Hillingdon from 1 April 2017. Once all current children's centre employees have been transferred to the management of the local authority, a decision will be made by Cabinet on whether the children's centre programme will move to the proposed “hub and spoke” model.
If agreed, the new proposed children's centre programme will introduce a new way of delivering and coordinating services, with five lead children's centres co-ordinating services in five localities areas through 11 linked centres.
The council says this new way of working will allow the council to deploy staff and resources more efficiently, while continuing to provide a high-quality service.
The children's centre service will be discontinued at Uxbridge College and Hillside in Northwood on 31 March, due to failure to progress towards agreement of leases, despite years of negotiations. The council says it is looking at alternative ways in which residents can continue to be supported in those areas.
The public consultation on children's centres received more than 600 responses and the council has been considering the views and feedback from residents.
Cabinet Member for Education and Children's Services, Councillor David Simmonds, said:
“We really value feedback from our residents – and have been very aware of support for our children's centres programme from the local community.
“It's wonderful to hear that these services are so highly valued by families – and we will endeavour to meet the need of parents and children across the borough.
“Residents have told us that they want consistent, flexible and co-ordinated family support, which meets the needs especially of the most vulnerable children and their families – but the current manner in which staff are deployed and organised doesn't allow for this in all areas.
“We now need to work with programme staff to reorganise the way we deploy staff and resources, so that we can best meet and prioritise need.
“The decision on the children's centre programme delivery model will be made at our next Cabinet meeting on 16 March."
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