FAMILIES in Winkleigh will be keeping their fingers crossed that the village pre-school can look forward to a brighter future, by securing its share of an £8-million county-wide funding scheme.

The scheme to redevelop Winkleigh Pre-School is in the first stage of proposals.

The funding, which has been allocated to Devon County Council through a Government programme, will help up to 18 pre-schools across Devon to secure and improve services for their communities.

Chair of Winkleigh Pre-School, Becky Parker, said: 'The government has to do feasibility studies on all the possible candidates for funding.

'If we get the funding that would be fantastic but if we don't, we will carry on doing what we are doing for the children.'

The pre-school currently has 15 children per session. Mrs Parker said the redevelopment would mean extending provisions for children in the village.

'We'd love to provide the children with more sessions and expand the school to provide additional activities, giving opportunities for parents to do first aid and parenting courses — anything that would equip parents to help them with their children.'

Mrs Parker said the 40-year old, temporary building which houses the pre-school needed a complete revamp.

'A new building is what we need. We want to carry on providing the best possible care for the children, which is our only aim at the end of the day,' said Mrs Parker.

The funding scheme aims to improve the quality of the learning environment to support the delivery of the Early Years Foundation Stage, with particular emphasis on improving play and physical activities and ICT.

The scheme wants to ensure access to services for all children and enable providers to increase their hours and offer a more flexible service for parents.

Devon County Council's executive member for children and young people's services, Cllr John Smith, said: 'This is a significant investment into updating and improving premises for young children, that will have a positive and wide-ranging impact on outcomes for children and their families.'

Mr Smith said the Better Buildings for Early Years programme used the government funding to improve the pre-schools' accommodation in Devon which most needed the redevelopment.

'We will be working with local schools and nurseries over the coming months to carry out the necessary research, before drawing up a final and more detailed programme for this scheme.'

Mr Smith said the county had drawn up a list of priority pre-school settings to be subject to a feasibility study.

'We need to ensure that the proposals are viable and can be completed within the government's time frame of completion by 2011.'