Schools across the Ilkley area seem to have escaped the knock-on effects of a massive teacher and staff vetting backlog.

At the time of going to press most pupils in the area were expected to have started, or be about to start, the new term as planned.

This was despite an acknowledgement by Bradford Council yesterday that the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) still had not managed to run new background checks on many teachers and staff.

But no list of affected schools was issued by the authority, which made this joint statement with Education Bradford: "Although there are still a small number of completed checks coming through from the CRB, there are still a significant number of outstanding clearances.

"Education Bradford has done everything asked of it, but, despite continual assurances from the CRB over the last week, it now looks as if there could be difficulties for some schools at the start of the new school term.

"We will continue to do all we can to support schools dealing with problems which might arise."

The CRB was given the task of checking the backgrounds of thousands of school staff before the Government's cut-off date of September 4 in a bid to stop paedophiles getting access to children.

But on Sunday, September 1, the Home Office conceded that thousands of clearance form applications had still not even begun to be processed because of mistakes or omissions.

While this meant many schools had to scale-down or postpone the start of their autumn term, in and around Ilkley pupils seemed to be enjoying a smoother start.

Addingham Primary and Westville House School were both planning to open as scheduled today, while Burley and Woodhead C of E Primary also said it had avoided any problems.

Head teacher Sue Adsett said: "None of our teachers is affected by this. We do have a number of new support staff but their work is supervised, and we have been following the advice given from the local authority. This is not affecting our openings for the new term."

It was the same story at Ashlands Primary, All Saints' Primary, Sacred Heart Primary, Clevedon House and Moorfield in Ilkley, and at Burley Oaks Primary.

New students at Ilkley Grammar, meanwhile are due to be given their induction tomorrow with the main school returning on Monday, as planned.

Chairman of governors Michael Noble said: "There may be one or two slight delays with individual teachers but there is no problem with us opening as normal."

Many schools said they had avoided any disruption from the vetting process because their staff had not changed and so had no need to be checked.

The opening position at Ben Rhydding Primary still remained unclear at the time of going to press.