Phoenix won’t rise at the old Breeze Hill school site

DEMOLITION has started at the former secondary in which a new free school staffed by former soldiers had hoped to open.

Phoenix Free School, given the go-ahead last month, had earmarked the empty Breeze Hill school as a possible home. But the council confirmed that it had been given permission by the Government to dispose of the site.

Phoenix is among 102 new free schools — state-funded schools free from local authority control — given approval to open in September next year.

Phoenix must now identify another site, but there are concerns that councils are being forced to hand over land for less than it is worth.

Tom Burkard, lead proposer for Phoenix, is disappointed at the demolition of Breeze Hill — but stressed that there were possible alternatives in Oldham and Rochdale. They include the former Hill Top School, Rochdale, which was used as the set for the BBC drama “Waterloo Road”.

“As far as I understand, there is still at least one empty high school left in Oldham,” said Mr Burkard, a US Navy veteran and education publisher.

“If we have to go to Rochdale then so be it. But we would still probably recruit the bulk of our pupils from Oldham.”

Phoenix will open with 120 Year 7 pupils and eventually have 780 pupils, including a sixth form.