HAYDON Bridge High School has ended a 42-year association with its Ridley Hall boarding wing.

Northumberland County Council had been leasing the property from its owners, the Evans family, to accommodate long-distance pupils, since 1975.

But with the school set to break free from local authority control and become a sponsored academy this summer, the county council lease agreement, which expired on April 24 was not extended.

Ridley Hall closed at short notice in early March. Its two dozen boarders now have to travel in daily, some having a three-hour round trip.

The county council and the school’s interim executive board (IEB) dispute who was responsible. Now the IEB, appointed by the Government in February, is proposing to scrap boarding facilities at Haydon Bridge High for the “foreseeable future.”

In a letter to parents, chairman of the IEB Ruth Dolan, said Ridley Hall initially closed on a temporary basis, on safeguarding grounds, due to staffing numbers. But she admitted that the school did not have the funding to provide boarding facilities.

Mrs Dolan said: “To date, boarding has been funded by the local authority under arrangements linked to county transport policy, and by events and activities at Ridley Hall.

“The grant funding did not cover the whole cost of operating the boarding facility and it is neither right, nor possible, to subsidise boarding provision from the school’s main budget.

“The IEB has commenced a 30-day consultation regarding its proposal not to re-establish boarding provision for the foreseeable future.”

It is not known how the proposal will impact on a small number of staff based at Ridley Hall.