IT AIN'T over till the fat lady sings - and she hasn't even started yet.

That's the view of Cllr Della Jones, who has joined forces with North Dorset MP Robert Walter to mount a rearguard action to save Milton Abbas school.

They both attended a packed meeting in the village where Mr Walter took up the cudgels to try to keep all four bases of the Dunbury School open.

Education chiefs have decided to close one of the bases of the federated schools which has campuses at Winterbornes Stickland, Whitechurch and Kingston as well as Milton Abbas.

But Mr Walter says it is against government policy - modified in June to include federated schools - to lose any.

"The Dunbury Federation is an exemplar of the very best in rural primary education," he said.

"The governors and Dorset County Council are the victims of successive underfunding by the government.

"It is nonsense to be closing down part of the very best pioneering rural school federation in the country.

"I shall make the case to the Schools Organisation Committee that such a closure is contrary to government policy. I shall also point out that other rural school federations are funded as individual schools, rather than as just one school. That in itself would solve the funding problem."

Mrs Jones said DCC had asked the governing body the wrong question.

"The governors were told they had to go for a closure of a base and they were asked which one it should be," she said.

"They were not given the option to keep all four bases open.

"It's not over till the fat lady sings and this fat lady hasn't even started."

DDC education chief David Goddard said the governors had had the option of keeping all four bases but there was no money to make that sustainable.

He also said that DCC had "no knowledge" of any government funding to keep rural schools open.

The Schools Organisation Committee will make a decision on September 21.

First published: September 10