SCHOOLS in Bromsgrove are reaching "saturation point" and can't find space for any more pupils in some age groups.

Headteachers are warning that education chiefs may now have no alternative but to look at transferring pupils to other schools out of the town.

"We have an acute shortage of places, particularly for Year Seven," said Julia Adams, head of Aston Fields Middle School.

"We have a high level of oversubscription and only four places left in a school of 631. We have waiting lists for all year groups. We're very close to saturation point."

Movement around the school is already carefully controlled. Mrs Adams said a one-way system operated in one of the corridors and children had to leave classrooms through fire doors for safety reasons.

At Parkside Middle, in Stourbridge Road, head John Graham says the school is full.

"There are no places for Year Seven pupils and families are coming in from all over," he said.

The school has three temporary buildings with two classrooms each and Mr Graham says each of the four years at the school was over subscribed.

"The school was built in 1912. We have the classrooms but we don't have the extra corridors or the toilets or the computers the children need to be educated in the 21st century," he said. "It's affecting their education. Even if we had the money now it would be 2005 before anything could be completed."

County councillor June Longmuir (Con - Bromsgrove south) said both North and South Bromsgrove High Schools were "in major need of development in terms of space."

She said the situation had been manageable up to now but it was difficult to see how it could be maintained.