AN angry parent has hit out at the nursery her child attended after it closed down, with parents only being notified the day before.

Shahanara Begum said she received a call at 6.30pm last Wednesday, two hours after she had picked up her four-year-old son, from a member of staff at Piccolo Day Nursery in Shipley.

During the call, she said she was told the nursery, in Bradford Road, was closing down as of Thursday last week, leaving her without childcare for her son.

The 38-year-old NHS translator has had to take time off work to care for her son, who starts primary school in September, and said the manner in which the closure was announced was “unprofessional”.

She said: “The nursery suddenly closed without notice, leaving a lot of people in limbo with two months of term left.

“My son is devastated, he has been going there on afternoons for the past two years.

“I got the call from a mobile number from a member of staff who said ‘we are really sorry and our nursery is closing down’.

“It was a member of staff, she said she’d only found out that day too. They had been told to call all the parents by their manager.

“We were told we could collect belongings but I was banging on the door and there was no reply and no-one answering the phone.

“It was really upsetting and now I have to juggle caring for my son and my mother who is poorly. My husband and I both work so everything is in a mess.

“It just feels so unprofessional to tell us at such short notice about the closure.”

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Ms Begum contacted her son’s upcoming primary school, High Crags Academy, about the issue, and has been promised a place in its pre-school for the final half-term of this school year.

Piccolo Day Nursery has been in operation since 1988, and provided care for more than 40 children, with 10 full-time child care staff.

It was inspected by Ofsted earlier this year and was rated inadequate in all areas, with inspectors finding failings in areas including children’s health and safety, safeguarding, insufficient emotional support, a poor quality of teaching and play, not using assessment information well enough to support children’s progress, and a failure to inform new staff about health and safety, including fire safety.

A spokesperson for Ofsted said: “Ofsted has not closed this nursery – the nursery owner took this decision.

“Ofsted has no regulatory power about the amount of notice nurseries have to give to parents and carers about closure, but we would hope that nurseries keep them up to date with significant developments such as this.”

No-one from Piccolo Day Nursery could be reached for comment on the closure.