TROUBLED St Anthony’s Primary School in Cinderford is to move onto the Forest High School campus after a damning Ofsted report condemned the current Belle Vue Road site as ‘unsafe’.

The former independent Roman Catholic school was placed in Special Measures following a failed inspectors report in May last year.

A subsequent monitoring report in December showed that leaders and managers had still not taken effective action to improve standards.

Since then, the school has been taken over by South Gloucestershire and Stroud College, which also took over Forest High School in Causeway Road after it too went into Special Measures.

The college now plans to take up excess capacity at the High School by transferring St Anthony’s pupils and staff onto the Causeway Road site.

In a letter to parents, Kevin Hamblin, the chief executive of the SGS Academy Trust, said: “I am delighted to announce that the Government’s Department for Education has accepted our arguments and have agreed to finance a move onto the Forest High School site from September this year.”

Mr Hamblin has assured parents that both schools will retain their independent characters but will share resources such as sports facilities, IT equipment and science classrooms.

The two schools will also have separate entrances and playgrounds.