THOUSANDS of pounds of damage has been caused to a Leigh school by mindless vandals.

The vandals broke 18 windows in the kitchen of Leigh CE Junior School on Henrietta Street at around 8pm on Friday and stole a laptop.

Staff spent the weekend cleaning up the mess caused before the school reopened but were dismayed when the culprits had returned on Tuesday and broke a further four windows.

Head teacher Stephen Callaghan said: “They smashed small windows in the kitchen so glass went everywhere. It was in all the cooking utensils – it was a hell of a mess.

“They forced open a basement door and came up a staircase that leads to the main hall and swiped the laptop.

“They then gained entry to a store room and found a bottle of tomato ketchup which they then smeared all over the walls and ceiling. It was just unwarranted vandalism.

“They then returned on Tuesday and smashed the four windows they hadn’t managed to break on Friday so with that and the laptop we are looking at about £2,000 of damage.”

The windows have been boarded up and will be replaced with smash-proof glass to prevent similar incidents from happening again.

“This is money that would otherwise have been spent on learning resources so the children will suffer as a consequence,” Mr Callaghan said.

“I don’t think this was a targeted attack, I just think ours just happened to be the nearest windows.”