A FORMER school building set to be demolished to make way for Burnley’s controversial free school has suffered fire damage after a suspected arson attack on Saturday night.

Four fire engines were called to the former Hameldon Community College site, in Byron Street, at around 10.30pm after reports the outside of the building was on fire.

Fire crews remained on the scene until the early hours of the morning as they brought the blaze under control, and police have now launched an investigation.

Andy Coulton, crew manager at Burnley Fire Station, said: “It looks like the building was set on fire by a group of youths who had gone on to the site and who were seen by the security guard. Access is quite difficult because the site is fenced off to stop unwanted people gaining access, although this group obviously managed to do so.

“Once we had managed to get in we got the fire under control quite quickly. We had four pumps at the fire as well as an aerial ladder platform from Hyndburn.

“Eight firefighters with breathing apparatus used water jets to extinguish the fire and we were there until about 1.30am.”

The former school is set to be demolished to make way for the 650-place Burnley High School, a free school that has proved controversial because other schools have hundreds of vacant places they are struggling to fill.

Mr Coulton said: “It looks like they set fire to the outside of the building but when we arrived it was starting to spread to the roof space and to the inside as well.

“It could have been very dangerous, and it also meant that we had pumps from across East Lancashire dealing with an unnecessary incident started by children, when there could have been life-threatening fires to deal with elsewhere.”