Toy bus made by 'shedders' a hit with Looe pupils

Pupils at Looe Primary School are delighted with their new playbus

A new wooden play bus has been presented to a Cornwall school for children to play on after their old bus fell apart.

The bus for Looe Primary School was made by the Looe Shedders, part of a global movement of Men's Sheds that started in Australia 30 years ago.

The group used materials and tools donated by local business to make the bus, which took six months to build, organisers said.

Meanwhile, the shedders are fundraising so they can actually have their own shed, as they currently use St Martin's Church Hall in Looe.

The Looe Shedders have a last go on the bus after presenting it to the school

Peter Heywood, the publicity officer for Looe Shedders, said members came from all sorts of places and included women.

"A lot of them have some sort of techie background; they worked [by] building stuff."

"Often that sort of person needs to find some outlet for their creative juices after they have retired," he said.

Group chairman Chris Roy said, because members had no shed of their own, it was difficult building outside because of the bad weather.

The group needs to raise £10,000 so that it can start to build a shed.

Mr Roy said: "Having done a few community projects, we were approached by the school to say could we do something for them... replace their playground bus, which was two pallets screwed together with a few plastic seats.

"I thought we can do a lot better than that, and we have."

Children have said the new bus is "amazing".

One pupil, Charlie, said he wanted to be the driver and would take the school on a holiday to Brazil.

Head teacher Janine Waring said "I am so grateful. It is so hard to find a good resource for children, it can be really expensive."

She said she was going to hold a staff meeting on the new bus, and she was going to be the driver - because she is the head teacher.

Children crowd around the steering wheel, vying to have a turn