Nursery World - Why quality varies

My colleagues and I were furious after reading 'An insider's dim view' (Letters, 8 February).

(Letters, 8 February).

We have a family-run, private day nursery which has been operating for 20 years. We have never recruited agency staff because we have a bank of flexible employees who are able and keen to work extra or different hours to support their colleagues, if need be. Our ethos of caring for one another as a family extends to co-workers, managers, parents and children.

I would suggest that the letter writer's experiences in dire nurseries make perfect sense. No-one wants to work in these nurseries, so there is a need for agency staff, which in itself becomes a vicious circle of no permanent staff taking responsibility or pride in the care of the children, setting standards of acceptable behaviour.

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