MORE than 600 people have signed a petition to save a Newport nursery - which has served generations of children - from closing.

Newport City Council has outlined plans to merge Kimberley and Fairoak Nursery Schools from September 2021, amid declining pupil numbers and a worsening predicted deficit of £75,000.

The plan would see a new nursery school created on the current site of Fairoak in Church Road, which is around two miles from Kimberley nursery, in Blaen-y-Pant Crescent.

The two nurseries - the city’s only community-maintained nursery schools not attached to a primary school - already share an executive headteacher, and both have only been around half full in recent years.

But more than 600 people signed an online petition within 24 hours of it being set up in the wake of the plans.

“Please could you help us save our local Kimberley Nursery school from closing,” it says.

“The nursery itself has been open for 54 years but previously took in children of the Second World War in a childminding capacity.

“It has served many local children over many different generations.”

The petition says closing the nursery “will negatively impact our community.”

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A council report says Kimberley nursery is predicted to have a deficit of around £75,000 at the end of this financial year.

“The larger Fairoak building is sufficiently large enough to accommodate the children on roll across both schools,” it says.

“Kimberley Nursery School has been operating with a worsening deficit budget for the last three years, and currently there is no achievable plan to indicate how this can be recovered.”

Combining the two sites is estimated to save Newport council £60,000 per year, which would be be re-invested across the city’s school budgets.

A communication class for children aged three and four with additional learning needs specifically associated with Autistic Spectrum Disorder will be kept and relocated to the Fairoak site.

It is expected that children who would normally attend Kimberley school will be offered places at other nursery classes, or at Fairoak.

The council has agreed to move to a formal consultation on the plans.