A NEW village school won't be built on the site of one which has been condemned because of damp, it has been revealed.

Pupils at Colwall Primary School were moved from their home on Walwyn Road to a temporary building on its playing field last autumn because of the chronic problem.

The move cost about £2 million but Herefordshire Council last month said pupils wouldn't be moving back after declaring the old school unsuitable for repair.

Investigations also revealed the building to be inadequate for modern teaching leading to the council to announce it would either build a new school on the site of the old one, or build a new one in a new location.

But council leader Cllr Tony Johnson has told colleagues building on the current site won't solve anything.

"The water table there is rising," he said.

"You only have to push the grass on the green outside the school to see that.

"All the houses nearby are suffering the same problem but the report we have had does not say why.

"All we know is there is a very serious water problem there.

"It would be silly to consider rebuilding on the same piece of land."

As reported in the Hereford Times last month, remedial work to fix the damp will cost more than £650,000 and won’t provide a long-term home for the school’s 190 pupils “at a reasonable price”.

The council says a new school will cost about £6.5 million, a cost offset by a recent Government announcement of a grant towards building a permanent replacement.

The council’s Cabinet last week backed a plan to build a new school.

“The existing school buildings were experiencing unexplained and increasingly serious damp problems,” said a report to be delivered to Cabinet.

“Moving the school back into a repaired school building, without additional works to improve suitability and compliance, would have the school accommodated in lower than desirable standards of accommodation.”

The report goes on to say the situation is “highly unusual”.

“It has been described by the insurance loss adjuster as a once-in-a-lifetime incident,” it stated.

“The building of a new school to address condition and suitability issues is also quite exceptional.”