B&NES Council has been urged to grasp a 'golden opportunity' to address residents' concerns over plans to cut the authority's Children's Centre budget by up to 38%. The planned cutbacks are set to be debated by Councillors at a full Council meeting next Thursday, 16th January. Under the authority's current plans, the Council would retain just three or four 'hub' Children's Centres in Bath, Keynsham and Radstock, with the remaining centres needing to be run by voluntary or other organisations. Conservative Councillors have said that the Liberal Democrat-run authority must use the opportunity presented by the meeting to respond to residents' concerns over the current plans and spell out what action the Council will take to reduce the impact of the £2.3 million cuts.

Conservatives have also said that whilst some sensible savings can be made, the current scale of cuts to the Council's Early Year Budget would result in irreparable damage to the services provided by Children's Centres and have asked the Council to think again.

Conservative Shadow Spokesman for Early Years, Children and Youth, Cllr Michael Evans, said: "Despite numerous requests for greater clarity over the future of Children's Centres within B&NES, there remains much uncertainty over what services will continue to be delivered and who will be able to access them.

"Next week's Council meeting will be a golden opportunity for the Liberal Democrats to answer these questions and address the concerns of local residents. Most importantly, it will be a chance for the Lib-Dem Cabinet to listen to local people and agree to reduce the scale of cutbacks to Children's Centres in this year's Council budget.

"It is wrong for local parents to be kept in the dark and left fearful for the future of their local Children's Centre and it is time that the Council took action to allay these fears."

Paulton Labour Councillor, Liz Hardman, who has campaigning hard against the cuts and orchestrated a 1,000 signature petition triggering the debate, said this week: "The fact that over 1,000 signatures were collected in such a short space of time is indicative of the importance of Children's Centres to our residents.

"It is quite apparent that cuts of £2.3m are going to have a huge impact on the services provided in Children's Centres. Yet there remains a woeful lack of detail about the effect of these cuts.

"At the Council meeting, the Labour Group will be asking for detailed information about the effect of the planned cuts on the services to be provided in Children's Centres, the number of children who will have access to these services, how children are to be targeted, the number of staff who will work in the Centres and the opening hours. Without this information, how on earth is anyone in a position to make an informed decision?

"I would urge members of the public to attend the meeting at 6.30 p.m. on 16th January in the Guildhall."