Northumberland County Council says the move is vital to sustain learning standards over the next 30 years.

The authority wants to restructure the current three-tier system to cut down on thousands of surplus places.

The plan will mean the closure or merger of the county's 45 middle schools, which has angered parents, teachers and governors.

Northumberland County Council says the strategy is "the most important review of school organisation in recent times".

We have too many surplus places in our schools because fewer children are being born and so pupil numbers are falling Director of education, Brian Edwards

The move has come in for widespread criticism, with demonstrations and protests by parents, teachers and pupils at affected middle schools.

The authority says it has to act quickly to reduce more than 7,000 surplus pupil places.

It also says scrapping middle schools will raise standards of learning.

Recent government figures show Northumberland languishing in the bottom 5% of Local Education Authorities (LEAs) in terms of progress made Key Stages 1 and 2.

The authority's executive member for children's services, Jim Wright, said: "Doing nothing is not an option as our challenges will not go away. To fail to change is simply to fail.

"If we fail our young people now, we will reap the results for generations.

"There is evidence that changing schools twice between the ages of 5 and 16 disrupts educational progress.

'Poor buildings'

"Our schools and teachers work very hard to overcome this, with some success, but our young people need to leave school with an even higher level of skills.

"In Northumberland one in four 25 year olds is currently without work."

Director of education, Brian Edwards, added: "We need to reinvest in the future of our children.

"Our schools are in poor buildings, and it will cost �100m just to keep them standing up.

"We have too many surplus places in our schools because fewer children are being born and so pupil numbers are falling.

"Money spent on empty classrooms cannot be spent on teaching and learning, and we could give schools an extra �2.5m a year if we remove surplus places and reduce the number of school sites."

The council's executive is due to finally approve the plan on 9 June.