The sudden closure of a Wantage pre-school has left parents in a desperate scramble to find alternative places for their young children.

Rockwell House Day Nursery has closed its pre-school room due to a critical shortage of staff, with parents informed earlier this month.

Busy Bees, which runs Rockwell House, apologised for the ‘inconvenience’ and said it had transferred some children to its other nurseries.

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But many parents were forced to to find alternative places themselves.

Speaking on the day of the closure, a parent said: “My three-year-old is at Rockwell, Monday to Fridays, full time.

"Like many other parents, I've had to drop everything today, take emergency unpaid leave from work, to ring round to try and find him a place before the summer recess.”

Others took to social media to ask whether any other pre-schools were accepting new children.

Several pre-schools across Oxfordshire have closed their doors in recent months.

Dunmore Preschool in Abingdon shut 'on the spot' last month as it could not afford to re-register with Ofsted and renew its lease, and Rosehill Preschool in Oxford closed in March. Long Wittenham Pre-School must raise £3,000 so it does not end the academic year in deficit.

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A spokeswoman for Busy Bees said the decision to close the pre-school at Rockwell House was taken as a ‘last resort’.

She said: “This was an incredibly difficult decision and made only when all other possible avenues had been explored. We fully understand the impact that this may have and sincerely apologise for the inconvenience it might cause.

“Currently there is a critical shortage of staff within early years education. We are legally required to maintain specific ratios of staff to children or face prosecution. We have been doing all we can to recruit the number of staff we need and continue to do so.

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“We have made progress in recruiting new members to our team, however not as many as we need. We will only recruit staff members to our teams who are suitable to work in our nurseries, and high-quality candidates are increasingly hard to find.

“Our team at Rockwell have done a tremendous job and delayed holidays, worked longer hours and extra days to allow us to provide the places we do. Sadly, and in fairness to them, we cannot sustain this situation any longer. We are incredibly grateful for what they have done.

“Where we can, we have transferred children to our other nurseries and are informing parents where places are available. We have given parents affected by this situation as much notice as possible.

“We can only apologise for the inconvenience and reassure them that the decision is truly taken as a last resort.”