LESSONS have been learned after the re-opening of several schools in Blaenau Gwent was delayed due to legionella bacteria in water supplies, council officials have said.

An independent review carried out after the issue affected seven schools in the borough found “significant gaps” in the council’s legionella management plans.

An online system of gathering information, more training of staff and improvements to flushing of water systems will be carried out after a review by Integrated Water Services said the council’s practices did not meet current guidance.

At a special community services scrutiny meeting on Tuesday, Cllr Lisa Winnett said the review was “very damning” and claimed the authority had been ‘failing’ students and staff.

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“Why have we not learned the lessons from what has happened?” she said.

“If we have another lockdown with closures we could end up with legionella in our schools again.”

But council officer, Lynn Phillips, defended the council’s approach to school re-openings.

“There are some lessons to be learned here from a corporate landlord perspective and from an education perspective,” Mr Phillips said.

“From an education perspective we have already reflected on some of the practices such as the flushing regimes in our schools.”

Richard Crook, corporate director of regeneration at the council, disputed that there had been a ‘failing’ by the council.

“There is no evidence we have failed, we have taken a precautionary approach to ensure the safety of our pupils and staff,” he said.

But Cllr Hedley McCarthy questioned why schools were not ready to re-open on time.

“We had three months previously where this routine maintenance could have taken place,” he said.

Mr Phillips said schools were not normally closed for more than six weeks and that these were “unprecedented times”.

Cllr Haydn Trollope said the review showed the council’s “systems and policies are wrong”.

“It’s clearly stated that we are non-compliant,” he said.

But Mr Crook said there is “no evidence to say the failure of actions by the council led to schools not re-opening”.

Cllr Steve Thomas, the council’s Labour group leader, questioned why the independent review was not published until Friday, claiming there had been “a cover up attempted”.

“The leadership of this council want to hide this report and its contents,” he said.

However Independent councillor Wayne Hodgins said the claims were ‘distasteful’.

“The fact is we are learning lessons and playing the blame game is not helpful for any of us,” he said.

The committee backed implementing the changes following the independent review, and said these should apply to all council buildings.

In a joint statement, councillor Joanne Collins, executive member for education and councillor Joanna Wilkins, executive member for the environment, said: "The vast majority of our schools opened successfully by the date requested by Welsh Government.

"Unfortunately, early test results on water sampling at some school sites did cause us concern and where alternative arrangements were not found we made the difficult decision not to re-open those schools at that time.

"In doing so, and in taking this precautionary action, we continued to put the health and safety of our pupils, staff and families first. However, all schools were open for learners in the Summer term. Full home learning arrangements remained in place for the pupils that were affected.

"As a result, the council commissioned an independent report in order to give us the opportunity to review and strengthen our procedures in relation to water testing going forward.

"The report found that the council’s response did not put any learner or staff member at risk, but has made some recommendations on how processes could be strengthened going forward.

"We fully acknowledge the findings of this report and we will be working hard to implement the recommendations which include making improvements to training, policy and data monitoring.”