STUDENTS at a Dorchester school will be speaking in new tongues after a new language lab was opened.

Internationally-acclaimed author Minette Walters was on hand for the official unveiling of the new building at Thomas Hardye School.

The £2m building is kitted out with all the latest equipment to help students learn French, German and Spanish, which are taught alongside English and IT.

Mrs Walters, who has a degree in French and German, said the new dedicated building would help students in the vital task of learning foreign languages.

She said: "The way the world is going at the moment, I think if you can get a grasp of a language you're always going to be ahead of the game."

The crime author, whose novels have been translated into more than 30 languages, said British people tend not to speak foreign languages and rely on others being able to speak to them.

She said: "It's very embarrassing that people speak English all over the world so it's important that we try to communicate in other languages.

"As a writer I feel that anyone can read books in their own language, but if you can tackle them in their original language, even if you can't understand everything, you can begin to see how they are formed, and that's important."

The school's curriculum co-ordinator for modern languages Chris Buckland said the new centre would support teaching at the school, where every student must study at least one foreign language.

She said: "It's very important that the children that we teach realise that they will learn a lot from speaking other languages - it's the only way they will get to understand other cultures."

Mrs Buckland added: "A vast number of students go on to university to study languages or go and work abroad.

"They always say how pleased they are with what they learned with us."

As well as being the base for all the school's language teaching, the building also contains a new IT suite with more than 50 state-of-the-art computers.

Jon Paterson, a sixth-former, was on the Internet researching Napoleon's winning battle tactics at Austerlitz for his history A-Level.

He said: "The new computer room is a brilliant thing to have in the school.

"It's a huge opportunity because so many more classes can do IT.

"There always seems to be a lack of computers for people to use so this huge area will definitely help."