Government probe after four teachers at schools built on former landfill develop bladder cancer

Full history of Buchanan and St Ambrose site's conversion to be investigated, say authorities

Buchanan and St Ambrose High Schools, centre, in Coatbridge (Thomas Nugent)

The Scottish government is to investigate claims that four teachers contracted bladder cancer while working at schools built on a former landfill site.

Public health experts will examine the fears of parents and teachers at Buchanan and St Ambrose High School in Coatbridge that harmful waste chemicals were to blame.

Copper in the drinking water and elevated levels of arsenic in the blood of people attending the schools are also to be the focus of the inquiry.

Both the BBC and the Scotsman reported that four teachers had contracted cancer.

Three dozen educators from the NASUWT union have voted to strike over the issue, a year after the drinking water was tested because it was blue.

Last March, authorities found elevated levels of copper in the supply.

It has since been deemed safe, with John Swinney, the Scottish education secretary, insisting on Thursday that new tests carried out after pipes were changed found the water “met appropriate standards”.

But he admitted families had raised “significant concerns” about safety.

The initial conversion of the site from landfill to its current use is also to be probed, the government said, “to assess whether all activity was carried out in accordance with appropriate regulations and best practice to mitigate against any risk to public health”.

The review will conclude before the beginning of the new school year, the government added.

North Lanarkshire council has said it believes there is no link between serious illnesses and the schools.

Ms McCormick, whose son Kian attends St Ambrose High, told BBC Radio Scotland: “We’re asking for new evidence, we need testing done on that site as of the state it is today, not looking at old evidence.

“We also want our children to be tested, there was no mention of that in the independent review. We want to know why our children and staff are being sick.”

Additional reporting by PA