DISTURBED youngsters can look forward to greater help after plans to replace Summerseat Special School were given the go-ahead.

After months of waiting, two new units for pupils with emotional and behavioural difficulties have been officially approved.

Education bosses are relieved that their scheme has finally been sanctioned by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment.

Summerseat Special School can now officially close and be replaced by the new and wider-ranging Pupil Learning Centre on the same site.

It also gives approval for a new unit at Radcliffe High School which will cater for eleven to 14-year-olds with statements of special needs.

Pupils started attending both centres this week.

Coun David Ryder, chairman of education, admitted it was nail-biting waiting for approval.

Cash was also a problem - the budget was £60,000 short - but senior councillors and officers came up with the money during the summer holidays.

Council education chiefs wanted to close the Summerseat school, which Ofsted inspectors said was failing, last September.

But the then Secretary of State Gillian Shephard intervened to stop closure, leaving officers to draw up the new scheme.

Coun Ryder said: "The demise of Summerseat Residential School has been a long-running saga and we are now glad that the Secretary of State has confirmed that we can implement the proposals put forward earlier this year.

"We believe that they will give youngsters with emotional and behavioural difficulties the greatest possible opportunity."

He said it had been a seamless transition from special school to referral unit.

"We're very happy with this, it's pioneering stuff," said Coun Ryder.

"We are one of the first in the country with a comprehensive system of looking at disruptive pupils, from nursery age onwards and with adequate teacher support.

"We never took approval for granted from the DfEE," he said. "It would have thrown a spanner into the works if they hadn't approved the scheme, and we were obviously delighted when we got it."

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