PETE Dodd has two children, Jolyon, 11, who is at Hurworth school, and Aja, aged eight, who is at the village primary.

Both may well attend the new school, due to open by about 2008 if funding becomes available.

Like many Hurworth parents, Mr Dodd fears a watering down of the standards achieved by the comprehensive, which rates consistently in national school performance indicators.

In contrast, Eastbourne, although an improving school, has in the past been placed under special measures and levels of educational attainment are lower.

Mr Dodd said: "I worry that my children's education will suffer with this move.

"We do understand that times change but it is a crazy idea to build up something into a success and then close it.

"It's the old adage - if it ain't broke you don't fix it.

"New buildings and facilities are not a guarantee of anything and there is also no guarantee that teachers at Hurworth will be retained."

Mr Dodd is critical of Darlington Borough Council's stance over the affair and also previous denials that a federation between the two schools, aimed at raising achievement at both, would not lead to a merger. We were told that was merely a way of hauling Eastbourne out of the problems that it was in.

"Now parents feel like they have been conned."

He also said the council's children's services director, Margaret Asquith, was challenged to provide evidence that merging a successful school in this way would maintain its standards while at the same time raising that of Eastbourne.

He said: "She said this evidence would be forthcoming but it has not and we believe it does not exist.

"We have no antipathy towards Eastbourne, or the people there, we just want to preserve what is good."

Mr Dodd dismissed a charge that the reluctance of many in Hurworth to merge with Eastbourne was down to snobbery.

He said: "There may well be snobs in the village, but I am sure that their children will probably go private schools and not the local comp."