SIXTY teachers and parents turned up to a meeting to fight the "absolutely criminal" decision to close a secondary school.

And they criticised ruling councillors, who were due to rubberstamp the closure of Beardwood High School today, after none turned up at the meeting, despite being invited.

The council's deputy leader sent the executive board's apologies saying it had clashed with another meeting.

The Preston New Road school is earmarked for closure by 2012 under the £150million Building Schools for the Future revamp of education in the borough. Students will be moved to the borough's other schools, primarily the three new BSF superschools, and staff will be redeployed.

The meeting at the school was staged so parents and staff could speak to councillors about the matter they will be voting on at the executive board tonight.

But out of the borough's 64 councillors invited, only Sajid Ali, Simon Hugill, Naushad Surve and Iftakhar Hussain attended. No executive members were present.

Parent Sabiha Daji said: "The executives should be here.

"They're making decisions that they don't know about and that don't affect them."

Coun Ali said: "I am totally ashamed that out of 64 councillors invited to come tonight, only four bothered."

Headteacher Ruby Hussain told the people at the meeting that she "worried terribly" that children would not have a "good school" to go to. Andrew Clay, who teaches technology, said it was "heartbreaking" the school may close and would "destroy the community".

Christine Walker, a special needs teacher at Beardwood, said: "It's absolutely criminal that they're throwing away a good school.

"A lot of people making decis-ions are not Blackburn people and have no idea how much this school means to the town."

Joan Reece, a music and RE teacher has taught at Beardwood for 25 years. She said: "In 31 years of teaching I have never worked anywhere that cares as much about the children and the staff.

"Closing this school is a scandal and purely political."

Coun Michael Lee, Blackb-urn with Darwen council's deputy leader, said the meeting had clashed with an executive board briefing, arranged since May that all executive members had to attend.

The final BSF draft will be submitted to the Department for Children, Schools and Families for final approval after being rubberstamped by the executive board tonight.