THE new multi-million pound International Centre at Tavistock College should open on schedule, education authority officials insisted this week — despite another delay in the long-awaited project.

Construction work on the £2.5-million extension was originally due to start last July.

It was put back until the beginning of January, after Environment Agency concerns about flooding at the site forced a delay in granting planning consent. Now it appears work will not begin until some time in February.

Vice-principal Graham Stoate said: 'Obviously this is very disappointing; we are terribly upset this has happened and we are very concerned about it — it seems to be just one thing after another. We just hope it isn't going to be delayed beyond half-term.'

Mr Stoate said staff at the school were facing the setback with 'a sense of inevitability'.

'I have a feeling we just won't believe it till it's up and in evidence,' he said. 'At the moment it's not impinging on staff, but if in September we still have the same pressure with numbers of students and accommodation that was meant to be replaced, it will impact on staff and students.

'At the end of a long term this doesn't help morale and to hear of yet another delay isn't easy.'

And the bad news has been compounded, after the school learned that delays in tackling drainage of its playing pitches, originally due to begin last summer, has meant a question mark now hangs over the £60,000 grant for the work.

Mr Stoate said the £90,000 scheme had had to be redesigned — now the situation with the flood-prone pitches was 'in the air', heaping yet further disappointment on staff and students.

But a spokesman for Devon County Council this week insisted lost time could be made up on construction of the International Centre, despite schedule upsets.

'We are still hoping the building will be ready in September 2004,' he said.

The spokesman said new building regulations regarding air movement and acoustics came into force while the project waited for planning consent. This meant the building's design had to be 'tweaked' by contractors Mowlem.

'It's a steel-framed building and they can't order the steel until they have changed their design and proved it works — that's the reason for the delay,' he said.

He confirmed that funding for the drainage of the college pitches was also in doubt. 'We applied for the funding and we are waiting to hear from the New Opportunities Fund whether it is indeed the case that it has been lost,' he said.

Peter Sleep, chairman of the college's board of governors, said: 'Both the college and the governors are obviously disappointed at what appears to be a further delay, but I am confident the project will start in the fairly close future, because that is what I am told will be the case.'

The new international centre at the college will include 16 classrooms, new staff accommodation and state-of-the-art technology. There will also be an open-air theatre and environmental area.

It is hoped the new facilities will ease accommodation at the school. An unprecedented number of successful appeals for places at the college and good exam results meant the September intake shot up by 10% — the equivalent of an entire class.