By Brian Allison, local government reporter

A CONTENTIOUS proposal to close Bellfield Nursery School and merge it with Park Place was unanimously approved by Dundee City Council’s education committee last night.

The decision came in spite of a last ditch plea by parents of children at Bellfield to reject the merger recommendation and keep it open.

In a surprise move, the council’s Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition administration accepted an SNP amendment which deplored the way in which the closure proceedings had been handled.

Education director Anne Wilson, in a report, recommended the merger of the two nurseries should take effect from June next year.

A pilot scheme for parking and dropping off children at Park Place is to be discontinued and officials are to seek a long-term solution to acknowledged problems with parking there.

While denying the merger was driven by financial considerations, Mrs Wilson said it would save the council more than £82,000 in 2008/09 and almost £132,000 in subsequent financial years.

Deciding not to merge the schools would have meant having to spend around £320,000 on refurbishing Bellfield in a project likely to take 20 weeks and involve closing the nursery for the duration of the work.

Bellfield parent Deborah Gunning told the committee it was a thriving nursery until the closure proposal was made.

She said the west end would only have one council-run nursery school left if Bellfield was closed and it could turn out to be a false economy if there was a necessity in the future to create more nursery places in the area.

Mrs Gunning said most of the work required to be carried out at Bellfield was not urgent and could be spread over several financial years.

She also questioned why the original costs for refurbishing Bellfield had been given as £178,000 when they were now being told it would be £320,000.

She said the school was an asset to the community and should stay open.

Education convener Laurie Bidwell moved approval of the director’s recommendations. He said they arose as a result of the department addressing the over-provision of nursery places.

Mr Bidwell said good quality alternative provision was available at Park Place, which had the necessary capacity to take the children from Bellfield.

He said there were strong representations from both pupils and parents at Park Place to have the pilot parking scheme discontinued.

SNP group education spokesman David Bowes moved an amendment which reluctantly accepted financial considerations made the closure of Bellfield inevitable.

The amendment also called on the committee to deplore the manner in which the closure proceedings had been handled by the administration.

Mr Bowes said the proposed merger should have been brought forward earlier for consultation and the process should have been more open.

Unexpectedly, administration leader Kevin Keenan said he was prepared to accept the amendment. He conceded that the consultation process could have been better and that lessons would be learned from it.

Conservative councillor Donald Hay said the way the consultation had been handled was disappointing and had caused unnecessary stress for parents and staff alike.

After the meeting, Mrs Gunning said she was disgusted at the decision and criticised the SNP for not having forced a vote on the issue.

“I have no doubt the education department inflated the figures to make their case in favour of a merger look better,” she said.

“We have no faith at all in the education department. They cannot be trusted.”