New build school could replace closed Godre’rgraig Primary because of landslip fears

The new building would replace Godre’rgraig Primary School, near Ystalyfera. Credit: Local Democracy Reporting Service

A new replacement building for Godre’rgraig Primary School could be built after it was evacuated four years ago because of landslip fears.

Neath Port Talbot Council’s cabinet is set to meet to discuss the issue on 20 November.

One of the submissions from the council will propose a new-build, English medium school, worth £17 million, to replace the closed Godre’rgraig, near Ystalyfera.

The new building would provide 210 full-time and 30 part-time nursery places.

Children are still being taught in temporary porta cabins.

Pupils were relocated to temporary portable classrooms on the sports field adjoining Cwmtawe Community School in September 2019.

At the time, experts commissioned by Neath Port Talbot Council discovered a "medium" level risk from a quarry spoil tip close to the school.

Officials said that if a stream was blocked during bad weather, rising water levels and pressures in the tip could cause material to flow downhill.

ITV News Wales spoke to some of the parents of pupils being taught in the portable classrooms, in Feburary 2022.

Kristy Prescott, who has two children at the school, said: “The council's forgetting about our kids. They just put them in the cabins and that's that.

“I’ve got a little daughter who’s six months old, I don’t know if I want to put her in that school even though I love the school, I used to go to Godre’rgraig school when I was younger."

At the time of closing Godre’rgraig Primary, Neath Port Talbot's Council leader, Cllr Rob Jones, said the safety of children, staff and residents "must be, and has always been" the council’s priority.

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