THE Government is being urged to change its funding rules to allow for the redevelopment of a top-performing school.

Durham Johnston School in Durham City regularly achieves some of the best A-level results in the country and is much sought-after by parents.

But the school is split into two sites two miles apart and has ageing buildings that no longer meet modern requirements.

Durham County Council wants to build a new school on one site and hoped to access the Government's £2.2bn fund for secondary school upgrading and renewal.

The county council has drawn up a list of schemes for schools throughout the county but it cannot include Durham Johnston School because the Government's rules give priority to schools in areas officially designated as deprived.

Head Richard Bloodworth said one site of the school operated in buildings more than 70 years old while the other was built after the Second World War.

As well as problems with the buildings - one site has 14 demountable classrooms - staff had to travel between sites and the school had to duplicate some services.

He said about half the pupils came from deprived wards, even though the school was not officially designated as being in a poor area.

"It's fair to say that there are schools in a far worse situation than us but their buildings are significantly better than ours and they'll get money first.

"We think that's fair and I'm delighted that the council and the city's MP are going to argue for a change of the rules.''

Cabinet member for education Coun Neil Foster said: "The great difficulty that both the school and we as an education authority face is that although we regard its problems as being high priority, the Government's criteria will not allow them to be addressed as such under the present scheme.''

The city's Labour MP Gerry Steinberg said he would be pressing the Government to relax its rules and fighting to get the school on the list of schemes.