The London Borough of Wandsworth council has announced it is to charge £2.50 for each child who wishes play in the Adventure Playground in Battersea Park.* This initiative will bring extra money into the council coffers, although in the coming year Wandsworth council is cutting its services to children to the tune of £3.5 million.
The new charges at Battersea will be fine for children whose parents can afford the entrance fees, but it's a shame for those children whose parents are out of work or in low paid jobs. Apart from limiting the opportunity to play for the children of less well off parents, this Wandsworth initiative also seems to fly in the face of the Department of Health's Change4Life programme which promotes the idea that healthy children need exercise.
Is this action by the Wandsworth council a symbolic and a practical representation of what we really think these days about children and in particular the children of parents who are not affluent ?
Is this action by the Wandsworth council a symbolic and a practical representation of what we really think these days about children and in particular the children of parents who are not affluent ?
*See the Evening Standard report at http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23949345-you-want-to-go-into-the-playground-that-will-be-pound-250-please.do
This opinion item first appeared on May 13th, 2011 on the goodenoughcaring website at
http://www.goodenoughcaring.com
http://www.goodenoughcaring.com
