THE opening of three Torfaen primary schools will be delayed, with one of the schools not opening until next year.

Blenheim Road Community Primary School and Llantarnam Community Primary School along with Ysgol Panteg were all set to welcome the students in September this year.

However, delays in the tendering process for Blenheim Road and Llantarnam have pushed their implementation date back to October, while Ysgol Panteg will open in 2017.

The decision to approve the delayed opening dates was made by Torfaen council’s cabinet on Tuesday morning,

“We’ve made really good progress in terms of the build,” said Dermot McChrystal, the head of education services in Torfaen.

“We won’t be able to bring back that time to get them open for September in the new academic year.”

Mr McChrystal added that the issue behind the delay at Ysgol Panteg’s site relates to outdoor access, which has pushed the development back further than Blenheim Road and Llantarnam.

“We will be in contact with all our statutory partners and the community and obviously the parents to let them know and to offer them reassurance,” he added.

“We obviously have a transitional group in place for each of the schools and we are working very closely with the governing body, with the head teachers and we will make sure that everyone is fully aware of the change.”

It is estimated that the Blenheim Road and Llantarnam community primary schools will open on October 31, 2016, while Ysgol Panteg will not be ready to open until February 27, 2017.

“We need to look on the positive side of this and concentrate on the fact that we have three new builds under progress and that’s a reflection of how well we have worked within the remit of the 21st Century Schools programme,” said cllr David Yeowell, the executive member for education.

“The start dates and the completion dates of any projects are subject to the whim of all sorts of things that can intervene and hijack the whole process.”