HEARTLESS thieves have stolen parts from a minibus belonging to a Northumberland special school, forcing teachers to cancel trips for the children.

The vehicle was parked, locked and secured, at the entrance of The Dales School in Cowpen Road, Blyth, when it was vandalised.

The thieves cut through the van’s exhaust pipe and removed the catalytic converter.

Headteacher Hugh Steele said he was shocked and disappointed that someone would steal from a special school.

“As we are a special school we really rely on our minibus,” he said. “We use it constantly because out-of-school activities are particularly important for our pupils and we will have to cancel trips for the children because of what has happened.

“We will be without the minibus for at least a week and this will affect a lot of our activities, including swimming, which the children really enjoy.

“We will have to come up with a solution, such as the teachers taking the pupils in their own cars, which isn’t ideal.

“We have a budget for maintenance and repairs, but this isn’t a standard repair. We hope we will be able to claim through our insurance, but until we know if we can do that we’ll be left with the bill.”

He added: “It’s just so disappointing to think someone would do something like this.

“It’s obvious because of the signage that the minibus belonged to the school and we purposefully parked it at the entrance because we thought that was the safest place for it.

“We going to have to look at stepping up our security so this sort of thing doesn’t happen again.”

The thieves struck between 4pm on Thursday and 8am on Friday and the incident was reported immediately to the police.

A spokesman for Northumbria Police said: “We can confirm that thieves entered the school car park and caused damage to a minibus.

“We urge anyone with information about the theft to get in touch.”

Anyone who witnessed the incident or has further information is asked to call police on 03456 043 043 ext 69191.

The Dales School caters for children aged between four and 11 with a range of learning difficulties and disabilities, including Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD).

The Dales relocated to Blyth in September 2010 and opened at the former Bebside Middle School site. Formerly known as East Hartford School, it was previously in Cramlington, but moved to bigger and better premises to allow it to expand.