The Scottish Borders Council (SBC) has made a compulsory purchase order to provide access to the proposed new Primary School in Clovenfords.

This has been advertised and intimated to affected owners and occupiers, and will be submitted to Scottish Ministers for confirmation in due course.

The land the Council needs to acquire is general amenity land to the rear of the Old Vineries housing development and other land in the area not currently in Council ownership.

When preparation work on the new school began in August 2005 the preferred access route was through the Old Vineries. This route offers a safer route to school for parents and pupils and its use would also improve road safety for all users of the A72 through the village.

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Despite concerted attempts to negotiate a sale, a number of residents of the Old Vineries refused to sell their share in the amenity land.

An alternative access route to the new school from Caddonfoot Road was agreed in principle with the developer of an adjacent proposed housing development.

The housing development has not started on site yet and there is no certainty of when work will begin.

Planning consent for this Caddonfoot Road access was agreed in July 2007 but the delay in the start of the housing development has resulted in an extra cost to the Council’s school project.

To try to reduce this cost, the project team has now reconsidered the preferred access to the school through the Old Vineries amenity land and now needs to secure that and other land outwith the Council’s control.

Councillor Catriona Bhatia, Executive Member for Education, added: "This new school is desperately needed and we simply cannot risk not being able to start on the school building in April 2010. I do hope that even at this late stage an agreement with the residents of the Old Vineries can be achieved."

(GK/JM)