Pupils who still learn in a village hall three years after a fire destroyed their school now face its closure.
Children at Manorbier VC School have been educated at a nearby village hall ever since a fire broke out in the roof space in October 2022.
Parents have accused Pembrokeshire council of letting down the children and the community and breaking promises to rebuild the school, with proposals to now close it permanently.
Cabinet members declined to be interviewed and said “all views will be taken into consideration” during a consultation.
Manorbier is a voluntary controlled school, which means that although it is funded by the local authority, it is affiliated with the Church in Wales.
In May, a majority of councillors from all parties voted to hold a consultation with St David’s Diocese on the closure of Manorbier and Ysgol Clydau in North Pembrokeshire.
More than 1,000 people have now signed a petition on the council’s website calling on it to “honour its promise” and “rebuild the school.”
In July, the St Davids Diocesan board of finance said it had “always required that the school be reinstated” and until May had “always been led to believe that the school would be reinstated by Pembrokeshire County Council.”
Manorbier School opened in 1873, and the building would have celebrated its 150th anniversary in January 2023 had it not been for the fire.
Since the blaze, pupils have been educated at nearby Jameston Village Hall. There are now 28 pupils at the temporary school.
The council said in May that Manorbier VC School had the highest level of surplus places of all Pembrokeshire schools at 77.9%.
Becky, a former pupil and mother of a Year 2 student, praised the efforts of staff but said the village hall was not a permanent solution.
“It’s not big enough and not set up to be a school.
“They’ve done so well setting it up, but we need our building back. I feel like the council has really let us down.
“They led us to believe they were going to rebuild it. They’ve given us false hope and false information. They’ve really let the community and the children down.
“If a community doesn’t have a school, the community doesn’t thrive.”
Charlotte, who has two daughters at the school, added: “This is a wonderful building, but it’s not a school. They had a school.
“It wasn’t their fault that it was taken from them, so why can’t they have it back?”
She claimed there had been no support from the council.
“They didn’t help with anything. It wasn’t acknowledged for months. They didn’t reach out. A lot of us are really angry.
“We moved into the village hall alone, without support – no one came to help us carry the books we could salvage from the fire.
“It was all the parents, teachers, and the local community. I hope they see that we’ve all worked hard and fought hard for this. The kids deserve their school, and so do the teachers.”
In May, officials cited “a falling demographic over several years, significant surplus places, and only 18.5% of children living in the catchment.”
The council also said the capital cost of reinstating the school buildings and the funding per pupil, which is the highest in Pembrokeshire, were prohibitive.
The capital cost of rebuilding Manorbier VC School is estimated to be about £2.6m.
Conservative Senedd member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire, Sam Kurtz, accused the council of breaking promises.
“There have been promises to rebuild this school from both the current and previous council leaders, yet we are still here now, in a consultation, talking about closing the school.
“That’s wholly unacceptable, given what this school, the community, and the pupils have been through. I think they’ve been forgotten by the council.
“They’re using the excuse of the fire as a reason to bring it forward for closure. Would this school have been earmarked for closure had the fire not happened? I don’t think it would have.”
The council cabinet said in a statement that it could not comment on specifics while a consulation, which is in its final stages and will go live within the coming weeks, is under way.
“All views during this process will be taken into consideration before any decisions on proposals to discontinue schools are taken.
“We appreciate the strong feelings of parents in the Manorbier area, and the petition will be discussed by council in due course.”
