AMESBURY Town Council has called upon Wiltshire Council to rethink its decision to close the children’s centre in the town.

As part of plans currently under consultation half of the centres across the country will shut in a bid to save £400,000.

The Five Wishes centre on Kitchener Road will be redesignated to provide extra childcare, with the services currently provided at the site moved to the existing facility in Bulford.

At a meeting on Tuesday night, town councillors cited the pram pushing distance and the poor public transport links to Bulford as the main reasons as to why the centre should remain open.

Cllr Jan Swindlehurst said buses to Bulford would only have room for two buggies and parents who are already struggling financially and might be unable to pay the fares. She described the plan as "at best arrogant and at worst totally ill informed”.

“For a long time we have lost services,” she said. “We had our social services taken out of the town, they are now proposing to take all of the rest of it.

“This is the future of our town. If we don’t stand up and fight for it then nobody else will.”

The centres, which are aimed at children under fiveyears-old, offer a place of sanctuary for parents in crisis, professional advice and a range of parental courses.

All of the centres are free to parents and are staffed by professional childcare workers.

Wiltshire Council says it hopes the move will protect front line staff by saving running costs on the buildings.

Cllr John Noeken said research he had conducted showed that in the Amesbury and the surrounding area 750 children live in poverty. Of those 77 per cent were one parent families while 78 per cent were unemployed.

“Something is going wrong here,” he said. “We can be doing more for these children and it starts at zero to five.

“I think we have to be clear as a town council that we oppose what is being suggested here.”

The consultation on the future of the children’s centres in Wiltshire can be accessed from the council’s website.