And the pair believe the site could still be riddled with potentially lethal faults ? despite the fact that it has now been given the all-clear following a final inspection this week.

The men also repeated Mr. Martel's allegations of a cover-up, claiming that officials have "tried to put a band-aid on everything to make it look complete".

Last month former site superintendent Mr. Martel branded the new school a death trap housing hundreds of building safety code violations.

Claiming that corruption and incompetence were rampant at the school, he said Government officials deliberately ignored potential hazards in their drive to get the project completed by the January 2006 deadline.

The Canadian inspector, who catalogued hundreds of safety violations during a two-week inspection of the building, was eventually fired after making repeated complaints against one contractor.

His concerns were dismissed as those of "a disgruntled ex-employee" by the site's management firm, Somers Construction, while Works & Engineering Minister David Burch said Mr. Martel would be "exposed for the liar that he is".

The Minister later said the allegations were "inflammatory, unfounded and absurd".

But yesterday Mr. Martel's former colleagues agreed to speak out ? and gave the whistle-blower their full support.

The workers, who are still employed at the site but have not had access to the school's main building for the past week, asked to remain anonymous to prevent reprisals on the job. But they said it was important to come forward so that questions about the controversial construction would eventually get answered.

Both men insisted that repairs to problem areas only began after Mr. Martel went public with his allegations three weeks ago ? and they argued that many faults probably still remain.

They scoffed at this week's statement by Lt. Col. Burch that the school was now ready for occupancy following a successful final inspection, pointing out that some rooms were still "totally not done ? no roof, no paint, no lights, no electrical".

They added that, while the school had the appearance of being complete, many problems had been cosmetically papered over in a bid to hide them ? and could be easily overlooked by an inspection team.

They also supported Mr. Martel's claim that he was axed from his post because he was highlighting too many errors at the site and that Government officials wanted him silenced.

And they said an in-depth, independent inspection was needed to get to the bottom of "the thousands of questions that need answering".

"There are cracks appearing in the walls all the time and they're just fixing up the surface and repainting it," one contractor said.

"What they should be doing is asking why the cracks are appearing and how severe they are. During the day you can see all the patchwork that's been done. That should be questioned."

Both men agreed with Mr. Martel that electrical wiring throughout the school represented the biggest hazard. They said that problems being uncovered now should have been dealt with during earlier phases of construction.

They also thought it unlikely that the project's electrical contractor ? Telford Electric ? has had time to fix all the faults since this newspaper broke the story three weeks ago.

"On that Friday all these danger and warning signs suddenly started going up at electrical points throughout the school," one of the builders said.

"That was the day when a lot of things started getting rectified. Would it have been rectified had it not appeared in the newspaper? I doubt it.

"But everything that Gabriel Martel said then was true ? in some areas the place was a death trap. I don't care who you are or what you are, if you have a 440-volt open panel, that's going to catch fire to something. All it takes is for someone to walk in there and spin around and you're dead instantly. That's serious stuff and it was definitely there a month ago.

"The question is, have those faults been corrected? Some of the items might have been rectified and they might be working on it, but they're way behind ? they're working steadily all day long but the electrician just doesn't have enough guys. None of the breakers have been labelled so if you want to shut off a room, you can't. He's going to be there for a while."

Mr. Martel said it would take up to a year to rectify the hundreds of faults he uncovered.

The men pointed out that miles of electrical cable stored at the site until recently has now been moved to another location.

"It's like the electrician was using the site as his own personal storage bin," one said.

"But it was there because it hadn't been installed ? and it's not going to be installed now because it would cause too much damage to do so."

The pair could not confirm that the project's timeline was repeatedly extended artificially to drive up costs, as Mr. Martel claimed.

But they did agree that projects were started and finished in a back-to-front fashion because Telford Electric was continually behind schedule ? and that resulted in tasks being carried out more than once and deadlines getting delayed.

"I don't know about any corruption but certainly things were not being done in the correct sequence ? it kept on getting pushed back because the electrician wasn't done on time," one of the men said.

"Normally the electrician is supposed to be one of the first ones in there. He's got to get his work done before you can get people in putting in the ceilings or painting or things like that.

"At Berkeley the electrician is so far behind. What that means is other people were doing their jobs, then the electrician would go in after and do his work. The painters or whoever would then have to go back and do their work all over again. That just doesn't happen on any construction site."

Neither of the workers, who are not employed as site inspectors, could corroborate Mr. Martel's claims that the structure's fireproofing was not up to standard and that some walls could easily collapse.

"We can't really comment on the fire protection being done," one said.

"We couldn't really see unless we got up a ladder and stuck our heads through the roof. But we back Mr. Martel 100 per cent. He has a great deal of knowledge and he knows what he's talking about."

The mammoth project has been shrouded in controversy ever since it was put out to tender by Government in November 2000.

Pro-Active Management Services ? identified as a high-risk bidder ? eventually won the contract and promised to deliver the school by September 2003 at a cost of around $70 million. But in August 2004, after repeated delays and a spiralling budget, the company was sacked from the job and the Ministry of Works & Engineering took control of the project, appointing Somers Construction as site manager.

At the start of this year Col. Burch confirmed that the school would open in September at a cost of around $125 million ? three years late and more than $50 million over budget. A legal battle between Government and Pro-Active Management Services, which claims its contract was wrongfully terminated, is ongoing.