A VILLAGE that suffered the blow of losing its only school is hoping a vital planning application will go through.

Milton Abbas is still reeling from the shock of losing its school last year - and it has been all change at the pub and post office, due to retirement and the death of the postmaster.

But a consortium of four community groups has been formed to try and access money from Salisbury Diocese which could revitalise the whole village.

Last year residents were expecting a new school to be built at Catherine's Well, replacing the picturesque but impractical Victorian institution in the main street. Not only did that fall through, but Dorset County Council closed the Milton Abbas base of the Dunbury School.

Salisbury Diocese, which owns the school buildings, is in negotiation to have it turned into three homes.

And church bosses have offered the profit on a fourth house - which could be built on the school playground - to the village for educational use.

Now Milton Abbas Trust for Community and Heritage (Match), Rainbow Pre-school, the Sports Club and the Tregonwell Almshouses have put forward an application for that fourth home.

If successful, the money would be used for vital repairs to the almshouses - incorporating the reading room - and the sports pavilion.

Also, the village would be much nearer the dream of a community hall - one of Match's projects - on the Catherine's Well site.

Consortium spokesperson Michael McAvoy said: "It would provide the basic matching funding for any application to the lottery for the community centre and it would provide the venue for a whole range of educational activities.

"It would house the Rainbow Pre-school and it would affect other groups that currently have to be squeezed into the small reading room."

County councillor Hilary Cox and district councillors Della Jones and Michael Cox have written to planners to support the move.

The application "provides a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the parish to redress the ill-thought decisions recently taken by others that have had such a devastating effect on the whole community", they said.

Planners will consider the application when they meet on September 12.