NO DECISION has been made on what will happen to the site of an independent village school which closed earlier this year.

Since Hurworth House School, in Hurworth, near Darlington, closed in July, speculation has been mounting in the village as to what will be done with the building.

Now, staff who worked at the former school have told the D&S Times there are no immediate plans for the historic building.

Darlington Borough Council also confirmed they had not received any applications or plans for a change of use of the building.

Parish councillors have been receiving phone calls from villagers, who were concerned about what would happen to the site.

Coun Peter Allan said: “I have received about ten phone calls asking what is to be done with the building.

“There has been a lot of speculation in the village, but I know that Darlington Borough Council has not received any contact about any future operations on the site.”

Maureen Clapton, former secretary to the headteacher, said no plans had been made as by Lauren Pyrah lauren.pyrah@dst.co.uk to what was to be done with the former building.

“There’s been no decision made as to what’s going to happen to the school. At the moment, we can’t give you any more information at all,” she said.

The school, which was Darlington’s only independent senior boys’ school, closed at the end of the last school term after plans fell through for it to relocate to the site of independent girls’ school Polam Hall, in Darlington.

It was proposed the two schools would operate separate schools for boys and girls at secondary level, with the sexes mixing at junior school and sixth form. However, the project was called off when insufficient boys were registered.

Hurworth House had been operating since 1946 and was one of Darlington’s top performing schools.

A spokeswoman from the council said: “The future use of the building is unknown and there have been no planning applications received in relation to the building to date.

“Any alterations or changes of use requiring permission from the council, would, as part of the planning process, include an advertisement in the local press, notices displayed at the site and letters sent to neighbours.”