A report (March 6) stated our SureStart centre is having to close in order to save £281,000 a year.

We have never received £281,000 a year. I accept not funding this centre will save a substantial sum of money, but nothing close to the figure quoted.

Southend councillor Mark Flewitt appears to suggest “funding has been found to allow services to continue”.

The inference of this is that the funding will be given to Little Treasures in order to continue to offer a level of service to our clients.

This is not the case. What is proposed is that one of the remaining centres will be commissioned to run services from our premises using their staff.

Our clients tell us it is the staff we have which attracts them to us, and it is not our staff who will be providing the service.

The report also mentioned the care for two-year-olds.

The emphasis on the two-year-old provision is again incorrect.

The church has a fully owned nursery that is totally separate from the Sure Start provision and cares for children from birth to school, an age range that includes two-year-olds, but is much more inclusive than that.

It is true the council has offered to commission services to be run using our premises, but it will not be Little Treasures and as a church we will be considering this offer and making a decision in the near future as to whether we accept the proposal.

It is also true that we are, as a church, considering what we can provide in the way of general services to support families in our community.

However, anything that we do will not be under the Sure Start banner. It will be under the banner of Westcliff Elim Church as part of our Christian commitment to our community.

We are also considering what specialist services we can continue to provide as an offshoot of our child care provision, but again this will not be under the Sure Start banner, as the Sure Start Centre is being closed under the council’s proposals.

Rev Michael Wright
Pastor, Elim Church
Westcliff