Urgent briefing demanded over school safety closure

Several ceilings were found to have safety concerns resulting in the short notice closure of Avenue Junior School

An urgent briefing has been called by councillors after a school was forced to close over ceiling safety concerns.

Avenue Junior School in Norwich was closed after a building surveyor identified "urgent concerns" with some of its lath and plaster ceilings on Tuesday.

Norfolk County Council confirmed 27 school ceilings were being inspected, and said it would confirm the names of the schools on Friday.

Norwich Green Party councillor Hannah Heochner has called for the county council to explain its contingency plans to get children into classrooms again.

Councillor Hannah Heochner is hoping the county council will provide information about plans to get children into alternative classrooms

Ms Heochner said she had been contacted by parents concerned over the lack of information as well as the impact on their children and their ability to work and carry out live online learning, which the school is planning.

“I really hope the county council will be doing everything in its power to make sure there is alternative provision to take pressure off families and enable students to learn in a way that is enjoyable," she said.

"We have obviously had the RAAC crisis not very long ago, so hopefully they triggered some contingency planning going forward for alternative classrooms," said Ms Heochner.

"If this contingency planning hasn’t happened, now really is the time for county council to take this seriously."

Liam Calvert says parents want more information about why the ceiling issues were not spotted in prior inspections

She is supported by fellow Green councillor Liam Calvert, who has a child at Avenue Junior.

"Why is it that one school finds a crack in the roof and then suddenly there’s a large number of schools that need looking at?" he said.

“They talk about being on a rolling programme of inspection, but I’d be interested to see when the last inspection was. I get the impression it was sometime ago.

"They need to act fast and reassure parents."

The county council said in a statement: "We carry out regular inspections of our buildings to check the condition.

"This issue relates to lath and plaster ceilings, with a suspended ceiling directly below. It is an area that is difficult to inspect visually and has come to light because a ceiling collapsed at one of Synergy Trust’s schools."

Lath and plaster is a form of lime-based background material applied to a timber frame. It was most commonly used in buildings in the 1930s and 1940s before modern plasterboard was invented.

According to David Wallace, contracts director with Stevensons of Norwich, a specialist firm dealing with the material, it can become loose with age or if it becomes wet.

He said replacing or re-securing ceilings with lath and plaster is usually only done to listed buildings.