CHANGES in Government law could have scuppered any plans to build a new school in Warrington.

The borough council has just completed a review into secondary school education across the town and one proposal being considered was to close both Padgate High School and Woolston High School and replace them with a new £18m school, built on Hillock Lane.

The new building would have been funded through a Government grant but under the terms of the agreement the new school would have had to be ready to open its doors in 2009.

But education chiefs say existing regulations - which require local authorities to run a competitive process for organisations that want to run a new secondary school - have been extended.

At a minimum, it would add four months to the timetable to create a new school.

Tim Warren, the borough council's interim director of education, said: "The regulations would seem to make the amalgamation options for a new school on the Hillock Lane site by September 2009 almost impossible to achieve.

"However, the Department for Education and Skills has yet to publish the associated guidance for either running the competition or getting permission not to run a competition.

"Perhaps, when we have that guidance, we can be more definitive in determining the implications for school reorganisation."

If the members of the borough council's executive board decide against building a new school at Hillock Lane when they meet next month, it leaves them with three options: doing nothing; closing Woolston High School and extending the Padgate site to accommodate extra students; or rebuilding either Culcheth High School or Sir Thomas Boteler High School.