2025-08-31-accounts

LYDIARD MILLICENT PRESCHOOL COMMITTEE Annual Report 2024-25

Tom Saunders

Committee Chair Lydiard Millicent Preschool [e-mail]

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Registered Address

Lydiard Millicent Pre-School The Butts Lydiard Millicent Swindon Wiltshire SN5 3LR

Tel: [phone] [e-mail]

Charity Registration Number

1029771

Committee Chair

Tom Saunders 45 Tower Road Peatmoor Swindon Wiltshire SN5 5BG Tel: [phone] [e-mail]

Existing Committee Members

Tom Saunders (Chair) Ben Williams (Secretary) Lesley Parsons (Treasurer) Hayley Graham Richard Halladay Jonathan Jeffery Laura Speed

Previous Committee Members

James Parsons

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Signed and Audited Annual Accounts

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Annual General Meeting

Thursday 25 September ’25 - 8pm Lydiard Millicent Pre-school

In Attendance:

Committee: Tom Saunders (Chair), Lesley Parsons (Treasurer), Ben Williams (Secretary), Hayley Graham (Committee Safeguarding Officer), Richard Halladay, Laura Speed

Staff: Sophie Haworth (Manager), Nina Wilson (Assistant Manager) Becky Bryant (Administrator) Parent / Carer / Resident: Sonia Martin, Jennifer Hemberg, Menille Paul

Apologies: Jon Jeffery, James Brown

Introduction and Welcome

The Chair opened the meeting and welcomed everyone.

Pre-School Manager Report

Sophie presented her report with the key highlights:

• Mentions of staff changes with new starter and leavers

• Improvements to the mud kitchen

• Have updated display boards

• Forward looks includes:

• Closer alignment with the school

• Updating the phonics program we use

• Renewing staff DBS checks

ACTION: Add Lorna’s to picture to the board.

• Amendment. Staff member resigned shortly after AGM was held. Action no longer required

Accounts for 23-24 / Update on 23-24 Activities

Lesley presented last year’s accounts. It was noted that these are currently with the external accountant for auditing and are presented as UNAUDITED.

Key points:

• Accrued for ~£6,000 for bills we expect e.g. electricity

• Income of ~£165,000

• Expenses ~£168,000

• Biggest expense other than staffing was ~15,000 for building maintenance and utilities.

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Budget for 25/26

Tom and Lesley gave an overview of next year’s planned budget. A key change is that this has been built on a “worst case” bases with no assumptions e.g. increasing headcount, fundraising.

ACTION : update the budget to reflect feedback

Review of activities

Tom presented a review of the past year. Highlights included:

• Significantly increased headcount on past year.

• Caroline, previous manager, retired after almost 25 years. Her hard work and dedication were recognized.

• Welcomed a new manager, Sophie.

• Increased fundraising.

• OFSTED inspection rated as GOOD. Shame to have been downgraded from OUTSTANDING but already working to address areas for improvement.

• Secured grants totaling ~£5,500 for improvements. Mainly for outside areas being refreshed.

• We have built strong relationship with our new landlords BlueKite.

Look ahead to 25/26

Key points:

• Committee to attend staff meetings to forge better links and transparency.

• Blue Kite plan on undertaking additional maintenance to improve the site.

• As finances have improved slightly, we will be reinvesting more into e.g. resources back to historical levels.

• Changes in regulations around consumables etc. could have a significant impact over £20,000 per year.

• We will end our contract with Childcare Marketing and are considering options that may be better value for money.

• Headcount for next Sept is low given ~30 children will be starting school, so we will focus on increasing this.

Election of Trustees

Chair – Tom nominated by Ben – unanimously passed Treasurer – Lesley nominated by Tom – unanimously passed Secretory – Ben nominated by Tom – unanimously passed Laura - unanimously passed Hayley - unanimously passed James - unanimously passed Richard - unanimously passed Jonathan J - unanimously passed

Questions and AOB

No AOB

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ID	Action	Owner	Due Date	Status
14.25.1	undertake a budget review after first salaries paid at new rate	LP	31.5.25	Complete
14.25.2	Meet with Blue Kite to review our rates	TS	30.6.25	Complete
14.25.3	Arrange an additional meeting in April dedicated to discussingthe changes to consumable costs	TS	4.4.25	Closed
05.25.1	BB to explore adding gift aid declaration for donations	BB	01.09.25
05.25.2	Committee to agree private fees from September ‘25	TS	01.07.25	Complete
05.25.3	BB to update new starter pack to include acknowledgement of voluntarysnack fee	BB	01.09.25
05.25.4	BB to draft email to parents and share with committee before sending	BB	26.05.25	Complete
07.25.1	TS to check with BlueKite if cleaning carpets is included within our cleaning contract. TS confirmed not included in our rates.	TS	01.09.25	Complete
07.25.2	TS to contact Childcare marketing to discuss notice for termination	TS	01.09.25	Complete
07.25.3	TS and LP to circulate draft budget for consideration offline	TS, LP	01.08.25	Complete
07.25.4	SH to share with TS what which policies will require updating	SH	01.08.25
09.25.01	Add Lorna’s to picture to the board. Staff member has resigned,no action required	SH	01.11.25	Closed
09.25.02	update the budget to reflect feedback	LP	Next committee meeting

Meeting closed at 9:12pm

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Lydiard Millicent Pre-school The Butts Lydiard Millicent Swindon SN5 3LR Tel: [phone] www.lydiardmillicentpreschool.org Email: [e-mail] Registered charity no. 1029771

24 March 2026

Chair Report – 2025

Thank you to everyone for joining us for tonight’s Annual General Meeting which gives us the opportunity to review last year and set out our plans and strategy for the year ahead.

Review of 2024-2025

The last academic year was a more prosperous one for the setting, and an improvement over the previous year financially. Headcount continued to grow and we finished the academic year with headcount higher than the previous year in 53 out of 60 possible sessions over the full 6 terms – a remarkable turnaround. Forecasted headcount for the year ahead is promising, which I will cover later

Some reinvestments were made into areas that had to be significantly cut the year before – including resources for children before - but we recognise that staff were still operating in a difficult environment with a less than ideal level of funding in some important areas.

We had a seismic event occur during the year with our long-serving manager deciding to take a well-deserved retirement. Caroline Mckellar had served the preschool for 25 years and we knew would be fondly missed. We also knew we had big shoes to fill. We were able to see off Caroline in style with a number of events, gatherings and gifts organised by the staff

With that we were able to hire Sophie Haworth and the committee have been extremely pleased with her appointment. Overwhelmingly we have heard good things from staff and parents alike and I am looking forward to working with Sophie this year

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The staff had real successes raising funds for the preschool – a special call out for Becky who really got stuck into efforts to raise vital money for resources – we raised just under £2.5k in total – well done and thank you to Becky

Our OFSTED inspection was held in March, and we were pleased to be awarded a rating of Good. This does unfortunately mean that our Outstanding rating was lost, which I know came as some disappointment to staff, however everyone should be proud of what has been achieved under challenging circumstances. We have acknowledged the areas that were marked down and Sophie is working to address them.

The staff had a really good clear out of the preschool building and it was great to see a less cluttered space to start the new year with – well done to all involved

The committee also had great successes in securing grant funding – most notably £5,000 from Wiltshire Council and £500 from Lydiard Millicent Parish Council. My thanks to Hayley for supporting these efforts. We are committed to reinvesting all of these funds into the setting – mainly to refresh the garden and outdoor play space. Hopefully you have already noticed our fantastic new mud kitchen that was installed over the summer

I have forged good relationships with Blue Kite Academy Trust since they took over the responsibility of maintaining the building we occupy from DBAT who dissolved last year. It has been great to see Blue Kite’s commitment to invest into the building to ensure it remains a safe and pleasant environment for our children.

Looking Ahead

Over the coming months Blue Kite will carry out improvement and safety works to the building including removal of unstable chimney block, replacement of double back doors, improved fire safety doors and a replacement canopy outside the back doors. They have also worked diligently to tidy up the garden area – notably cutting back hedges and shrubs and are also looking at reducing the height of the trees that surround the building to help improve the drains and gutters and damp issues present in some parts of the building

I have agreed with Sophie that a member of the committee will join staff meetings for a 30min slot each time on a rotating basis to answer questions and in a bid to be more visible and present. This is on the back of feedback received from staff who felt the committee were lacking in this area

We have had a very stable committee this year – my thanks to all involved who give up their valuable spare time on a voluntary basis to help ensure the setting remains viable and continuing to be available to the community we serve

I’m also pleased to announce that the committee is now able to reinvest further in the areas that were cut previously and the new budget reflects this, including an increase to the staff training budget, making funds available to refresh resources – back at the historical levels that staff were asking for

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But I must stress that the committee must still exercise fiscal caution during the year ahead as there is the potential for significant financial hardships going forward including likely living wage increases, repercussions of a change in government and some unknowns around policy and levels of funding. Most significant concern is the change in consumables legislation which represents a potential black hole of up to £29,000 in next year’s income. Steps have been taken by the committee to try and mitigate the impact of this, but we must ensure we remain vigilant and always ensure that the charity’s money is spent wisely and responsibly

The committee has decided to end our relationship with Childcare Marketing from December 2025 as we believe that now headcount is back to being a strong position and the financial outlay of £400 per month is no longer required. Some consideration will be needed to fund a provider for website operation and maintenance, however, which I anticipate to be in the region of £100£150 per month

Move to take feedback and questions on proposed budget and aim to sign off if we can

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Prepared and Submitted by

Tom Saunders Chair of the Committee

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