EIGHT mobile classrooms that have been used by a Salisbury school for the past 40 years may soon be replaced by a £1.3m building.

Bishop Wordsworth's School's plan for the two-storey block will be submitted to the district council by the end of the year.

The building will go in what is known as The Paddock. It will provide six classrooms and a drama studio, which can be used by the community out of school hours.

The money, which is coming from the Government's New Deal for Schools budget, has to be spent by the end of the financial year 2001/2.

The classroom block is part of a major rebuild of the school which, because of its old buildings and 17 uneconomical mobile classrooms has maintenance costs three times higher than the average secondary school in Wiltshire.

The other major project is a £1.8m sports hall, which has been given planning permission. Headmaster Clive Barnett said the school is well on the way to raising the necessary money.

He said: "It is ironic that we have planning permission but not quite the necessary cash for one of the projects and have the cash but not the planning permission for the other."