STAFF at a pre-school have been left angry and frustrated after coming back after half term to find the site had been vandalised.

Olive Tree Pre-School on Olive Road, Southampton has over 30 children that attend, from ages of 2 to 4.

The site has been closed this week because of half-term, and when staff came in on Wednesday, they found that the outdoor play area had been vandalised.

Deputy Manager, Emma Green claims that this isn’t a new thing, and that every time they are off, something gets damaged.

Emma said: “We try to put everything away the day before we break up, but there’s some things you can’t put away because they’re in the garden.

“I’m normally there first on a Monday morning to find that some of our outdoor toys are actually over the back in the park or on the roof of the adjacent building.

“It’s continual and I’m sure it can’t be older children. They must be fairly young because of the mindlessness of it all.”

In the most recent spate of vandalism, windows have been smashed, items have been thrown into the park behind the pre-school, and toys have been broken and left on the floor.

Staff say they would like more security, but don’t want to make the place look like a ‘prison camp’ for the children.

Emma added: “The children that we have here, some of them don’t have a lot, and the opportunities we give them are things that they wouldn’t normally be able to do.

“We raised a lot of money to build that outdoor classroom and the children like to go in there, so it’s just a shame that you can’t leave anything unattended because they just get broken all of the time.

“It’s quite disheartening for myself and the staff. We all work hard, we try and give the children the best opportunities just for it to happen every time we’re off.”

A GoFundMe page is now in the process of being set up to help support the pre school and raise funds so they can afford replacement equipment and improved security.