A public meeting on the future of St Philip's School in Girlington descended into a slanging match on who is to blame for the school's predicament.

Governors and Bradford Council are blaming each other for the latest delay in finding a new site for the school.

Around 150 people packed an ill-tempered meeting on proposals to build the new school on a community park at West Park Road.

Staff and pupils currently endure terrible conditions at their current site at Washington Street. "Temporary" buildings - already third-hand when they were put up 20 years ago - house the Church of England school, which has mostly Muslim pupils.

Vandals find it easy to get on to the site to smash windows, daub sexually and racially-offensive graffiti, and run around on the roof.

Cash has been set aside by Bradford Council to build brand new premises, but the idea of putting it on West Park has proved highly controversial. The park, which has crown green bowling and a basketball court, is the only green space in the area.

Bradford Council says only a third of it would be taken up by the school and the current school site in Washington Street would be "greened" to create a new recreation area.

But any planning application to build on the park is guaranteed to be opposed by Sport England as well as local residents. Some of them shouted angry questions at the meeting and vowed to fight such a plan all the way.

It was clear relations between the Bradford Council representatives and the school governing body had broken down, as they contradicted each other during the meeting. Director of Education Phil Green said his officers were waiting for a decision from the governors, which drew an angry response from the Reverend Tony Tooby, chairman of governors.

"We faxed you a note in September to say we agreed, you can't put it back at the governing body, we have fought every step of the way to move this forward," he said.

He threatened to keep highlighting the school's plight in the media and take it to Prime Minister Tony Blair if necessary.

Councillor Arshad Hussain (Con, Toller) who backs the West Park protesters, accused the different factions of "playing games."

"People are playing games. I don't know if it's the school or the LEA," he said.