Northampton nursery offers to open 24 hours a day to help key workers

A nursery in Northampton is offering a helping hand to the frontline workers during the coronavirus pandemic.

Omnipresence Nursery School in Freehold Street is offering to be open 24 hours to help key workers who may have lost their usual care provider.

Owner Dawn Louise Young and manager Sharon Norrell ‘want to do their bit’ by extending the hours they can provide child care.

Sharon said: “We’re offering to be open 24 hours a day to support critical care workers.

“We’re just being here so we can offer them support with child care for however long this goes on for.

“We need to support these workers so they can do their job that supports and helps us.”

The nursery normally opens from 7am to 7pm, so the 24-hour service is a new concept for staff.

Sharon added: “We’ve given a lot of thought to this and we’ve got all the staff together and they’re all supportive of it too.

“This is a big change for us but we want to do our bit to support the people on the frontline.

“We are following all the Government guidelines, making sure the nursery is always clean and making sure we are staying fit and healthy so that we are allowed to be open.”

The nursery caters for babies to children aged 14 and the 24-hour service is available for anyone who needs it.

Sharon said: “This isn’t just for the children who usually use us, it’s for the families whose nurseries may have had to close while we are on lockdown who suddenly don’t have any child care and for the key workers.

“If their existing child care has closed down, we are here and we intend to stay open.

“We will have to review this on a daily basis but we’ll stay open as long as we’re able to and allowed to.”

Visit the Omnipresence website for more information.