A council-run nursery is to be handed over to an academy trust with the blessing of the two councillors who represent the ward where it is based.
The decision to transfer Roundabout Nursery to the Aurora Academy Trust was made by Brighton and Hove City Council’s cabinet at a meeting at Hove Town Hall yesterday (Monday 29 June).
The cabinet includes both Whitehawk and Marina ward councillors – Gill Williams and David McGregor.
Labour councillor Williams, who has represented the area since 2019, said that Roundabout was “well loved” by the community as she backed the move.
The nursery will become part of the Aurora Academy Trust which runs the neighbouring primary school City Academy Whitehawk.
Councillor Williams said: “It’s a great school. I know it’s an academy but it is a really fantastic school.
“I am comforted – and I know the community is comforted – to see the school is committed to continuing the delivery of the all-year-round, all-day provision of the Roundabout Nursery because it is very much needed in that area.”
She praised the commitment to staff, with a pledge to protect their government pensions and to recognise their unions.
Her Labour colleague, Councillor McGregor, met representatives from Aurora to share community concerns and “have a look around”.
He said: “I was just so impressed by the work they were doing and the things they were implementing. To keep that service in Whitehawk and protect it was just so special for us.
“There were a couple of people (who were) a bit worried – but the conversations they’ve had in the community engagement are going really well.”
Labour councillor Emma Daniel, the council’s cabinet member for children, families and youth services, said that the council wanted to protect nursery services in one of the most deprived neighbourhoods in Brighton and Hove.
She said that transferring the nursery to the trust would protect the service, linking it with a school that had an “outstanding” Ofsted rating for its early years provision. It would also reduce pressure on the council’s budget.
Councillor Daniel said: “We know that early years work supports our strong commitment to closing that attainment gap and that fairness issue for children who are eligible for free school meals.
“And 48 per cent of children at that nursery are likely to be in that position.
“What we don’t do, as opposed to our predecessors in administration, the Greens, is look at a budget pressure – an issue – and kick it down the road.
“I don’t want to kick the future funding and sustainability of that nursery in Whitehawk down the road because those children deserve better and deserve certainty.”
The council spent almost £400,000 in the past financial year subsidising the nursery in Whitehawk Road. It plans to give Aurora a grant of about £440,000 over three years to take over the nursery.
As a result, the council expects to save £50,000 in the first financial year, £198,000 the next year and £254,000 in 2028-29, with an annual £365,000 saving forecast after that.
(At Bh Labour HQ)
Oh no – another academy takeover, removing education from local authority control – privatisation through the back door. We hate that sort of thing“
“No – we like this one – it saves us a few quid for a couple of years”
“OK. But won’t people think we are being inconsistent and hypocritical putting short term gains above our principles”
“No – should be OK. Just bung in a bit of gratuitous nonsense about the Greens doing some unspecified terrible and we should get away with it”
“OK. cool”
The important thing here is the sustained continuation of this provision. If that is best placed in an academy, then pragmatically that is best move.
So Labour should drop their policy of opposing academies on principle. Let’s evaluate who is best placed to provide education for our children. I know I no longer trust our local council to do that, so am pleased these Councillors now support academies.
The lack of oversight still concerns me with academisation, alongside other things like protection of staff, but that was specifically addressed in this instance. As always, nuance is important. Pragmatic tends to be a much more realistic stance to have more often than not.
Benjamin, “pragmatism” is a convenient label when it means abandoning principles. If academies are supposed to lack adequate democratic oversight, handing over another public nursery to one because it helps the council’s balance sheet doesn’t solve the problem—it reinforces it. Promises about protecting staff and maintaining provision are welcome, but they’re not a substitute for public accountability. If academisation is only acceptable when your preferred party does it, that’s not nuance; it’s selective reasoning.
Changing names is easily tracked, TW. Bit of silly strawman there, which unfortunately is probably because you relied entirely on AI to write that. It’s flawed from the very first assertion. AI claims abandoning principles, but hallucinates what that principle is. The “It’s not X, it’s Z” is very typical LLM structuring.
It’s another reason why people really shouldn’t rely on AI to make arguments. You potentially have a good debatable point deep down there, but you’ve ruined it with the slop. Do yourself a favour, give it another go, and we can have a reasonable, and human, discussion.