Early Years Service - local Solutions For Local Issues

The Highland Council has agreed to seek local solutions through local consultations to provide a sustainable network of quality early years services throughout the Highlands, which integrates child care with pre-school education in what is known as wraparound care.

Members have promised that consultation with parents and providers of services in key communities will be completed by March of next year – in time for parents to enrol their children for the school session starting in August.

Local issues are to be discussed at area-based workshops involving elected members and other interested groups, who are asked to make proposals for local solutions.

And a special seminar, hosted by the Joint Committee on Children and Young People but open to all elected members, is to be held to discuss the matter.

Early years services involve: -

Councillor Margaret Davidson, Chairman of The Highland Council’s Housing and Social Work Committee, said: "Early years provision is recognised as a key factor in local community sustainability. Families want wraparound care and to know that this provision is going to be secure, at least into the medium term.  We want to meet these expectations. In doing so we must be mindful of making the very best use of the monies at our disposal."

The Council was told that rapid development of early years services across Highland had been a major success story.

Bruce Robertson, Director of Education, Culture and Sport explained that after Scottish Executive funding was made available, rapid and pragmatic decisions had been taken to meet local expectations and to get nursery provision off the ground quickly. 

He said: "Accordingly, the configuration of provision now in place does not always fully reflect the needs expressed by families and there are major issues about ensuring these services are sustainable."

In 1995, pre-school education was available for 4-year-olds at 24 local council nursery schools. Ten years on there are 153 local council centres, with 105 of these including provision for 3-year-olds. There are also 100 commissioned private and voluntary centres.

He said there were now more early education centres than primary schools in Highland and while the services are well used the majority operate under capacity and only a few centres provide child care.

A growing desire of families, he said, was the availability of "wraparound" services, which integrate child care with early education across the working day.

He said the sustainability of services was threatened because of the absence of child care; duplication of provision; poor standards of accommodation and absence of transport in many rural locations.