Nursery chief welcomes cash

Happy Tots on Egerton Road, North Shore will receive £102,880 from a Government cashpot of £50m.

West Park Kindergarten will get £150,158 while £192,361 will be assigned to a private operator for a new nursery.

Julie Bryan, owner, Happy Tots nursery, said: “We are absolutely delighted to hear that our bid has been successful to enable us to provide 30 hours free childcare for working parents of three and four-year-olds from September 2017.

“We are currently at full capacity and provide 55 childcare places for babies to four-year-olds.

“Parents have been asking how they can access 30 hours of free childcare per week – some of those want to build on the current 15 hours and some want to get back into work.

“We were unable to meet the needs of these parents as we had maximised all our floorspace and without this funding, we were unable to support the delivery of 30 hours free childcare.”

The funding will help develop a two storey extension.

More than £2m of the public money is to be invested in the Government’s six “opportunity areas” - places considered to be falling behind on social mobility, which includes Blackpool.