WORK on building a new village school in Colwall, next to the village hall in Mill Lane, is well under way.

The new building is intended to replace the existing school at Colwall Green, which is suffering from an incurable damp problem.

Work began before Christmas, and is well under way, according to Herefordshire Council's head of education development Andy Hough.

He said: "We're very pleased with progress so far, and we're now looking at completion in Christmas 2017.

"The original school suffered from problems with water ingress, and st was also limited in size and had some access problems, which is why it was decided to build a new one.

"It would have been almost impossible to build a new school on the existing site.

"We feel we've got a very good design from our architects Quattro Design, and we're looking forward to having it completed and being able to move in."

The project is costing about £4 million, some of which has been covered by a grant from central government's Priority Schools Building Programme.

As long ago as 2014, the school was forces to move into temporary buildings on its playing field, while a solution was sought to the pervasive damp rising out of the ground.

Over the summer holiday that year, the temporary school building was erected using portable buildings, and the school moved into it the following term.

Following the move, investigation revealed that the damp problem would be so difficult to cure that it was decided to build a new school on a different site.

A planning application for the new school went in last May, and it was approved by Herefordshire Council in August.

Mr Hough said that no decision has yet been taken about the future of the existing school site, but the council will probably look at selling it off to recoup part of the costs of the new school.