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*Attached to clinics
Day Nurseries
The Council's 7 day nurseries have places for 379 children and at the end
of the year 353 children were attending.
The new Hillside Day Nursery was completed during the year and opened in
October. The former nursery in Holmleigh Road had been established in a former
tennis club pavilion and was re-built on adjacent ground in Leather head Close.
The new nursery accommodates 60 children. A milk kitchen had been built so that
very young babies can be admitted when necessary. The youngest child accommodated
up to the present time was aged 9 months.
There are three large nursery rooms. The children will mix as frequently
as possible. Nevertheless, nursery 1 accommodates children up to the age of 2½
years who have there afternoon rest away from the older children, aged 2½-5
years, who occupy nurseries 2 and 3. One of the bathrooms caters for 40 children
and is equipped with 8 small toilets and 12 wash basins. The second has 4 toilets
and 6 wash basins for 20 children. The matron's office adjoins the entrance hall
and there is a large staff sitting room cum dining room.
An analysis made in June 1970 of children's reasons for attending a day
nursery showed that of the 364 children present:-
325 were admitted because they had only one parent
27 " " for health reasons of parent of child
In addition, 14 children were attending day nurseries under the special scheme
for severely subnormal children and 1 under the scheme for deaf children.
One additional day nursery with 50 places (at Holly Street) is planned in
the Borough.
The Day Nursery Service has unfortunately continued to be hampered by staff
shortages. Regrettably there does not appear to be any immediate solution of
the recruitment difficulty and in the long term the staffing of the nurseries
must rest on the number of nursery students coming into the service and their
retention. There are many deterrent factors — long hours, low rates of pay,
better conditions in office jobs or with the Education Service.
The demand for day nursery places always exceeds supply; it would seem that
even with the additional nursery to be built and with all the existing day
nursery places fully staffed so that they could be used to maximum capacity,
there would still not be sufficient places to meet all the demands.