Parents of pupils at an island primary school have questioned the viability of housing two separate schools on a single site.

The concerns were raised following an announcement that St Thomas’ Church of England school was to relocate to share a site at Meadow Crescent in Saddlestone with Scoill Vallajeelt.

The Department for Education and Children has previously said there would be enough space at the Vallajeelt site to accommodate two schools, which would operate separately on the same site.

But this week some parents said they had no issue in principle with welcoming children from St Thomas’ but doubted it was the best solution for the children if the schools operated separately on a shared site, rather than simply merging.

One parent said: ’None of the parents is in favour of co-location due to the issues that it will bring and the fact it is religious segregation. Parents want the schools merged.’

A parents’ group spokesman, who asked to remain anonymous and whose son is a pupil at Vallajeelt, said he too had grave reservations about the decision to run two schools from one site rather than merge them.

’It seems they will have two heads, two governing bodies, two sets of policies all in what was a single entity. There seems to be influence from the church that they stay separate.’

He also questioned the level of consultation undertaken by the education department before the announcement of the move. Two meetings were organised to discuss the relocation of St Thomas’ - of which Vallajeelt parents had two days’ notice and St Thomas’ parents had one day’s notice, he said.

A freedom of information request asking for documents relating to the decision produced material supporting the inadequacy of St Thomas’ school but little to support the co-location at Vallajeelt, he said.

The spokesman said an alternative proposal to use the former post graduate medical accommodation at Westmoreland Road seemed more feasible, with pupils sited closer to their former school and able to make use of the facilities such as playing fields at the Henry Bloom Noble School.

’There’s no indication why Vallajeelt was chosen. Vallajeelt only came up in discussion in March,’ he said.

Isle of Man Newspapers has asked the Department of Education Children whether we could go inside St Thomas’ School to photograph its interior after the announcement of its closure was made.

But our request was declined.