Owner of Creepy Crawlies play centre offers site as vaccine hub

Janice Dunphy, of Creepy Crawlies in Wigginton Road, which was forced to close under Tier 3 restrictions, said she wanted to be ‘part of the solution’.

Janice chairs the national Family Entertainment Centre Association, and said members had offered their closed play centres to be used and for their teams to be trained to help.

Creepy Crawlies has ample indoor space, a big car park, large fridges and freezers and is close to York Hospital, if necessary, she said.

“We have already made the offer to DCMS (the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport). We just want to help to get our economy open and our people safe. We want to be part of the solution.”

Janice, who owns Little Bugs Nursery on the site and the Web Adventure Park, has also been pressing for more help for businesses forced to shut under the new tier system.

“Gyms can open but play centres can’t in Tier 3 - yet really, they’re indoor gyms for children. It seems that children are not being considered. They need some respite and play.”

Janice, who recently featured on Panorama’s Business on the Brink, said: “I have spoken to DCMS to put pressure on the Treasury to assist indoor centres such as ours but I am not planning for a positive response. They are trying to save many sectors so we join a long queue.

“I think we will be closed for a while as Tier 3 is here to stay and four is looming. Boris mentioned April before things will start to improve.

“We will lose our busy period now, which builds us up for the rest of the year, but effectively nine months of closure is really hard to stomach.”

Janice said her business had received some support but not enough to prevent them from using up savings, previously earmarked for vital improvements to the attraction’s animal enclosure, on running costs. As an employer who has retained staff, Janice had been expecting more than £28,000 from the Government JRS bonus but this was replaced by the furlough extension until March.