Education bosses are failing pupils with behavioural problems in Bradford by not providing them with a specialist school, according to a Government watchdog.

Schools inspector Ofsted says Bradford Council is not meeting the needs of children with emotional, behavioural and social difficulties because of a lack of permanent schools for them.

And a councillor who sits on a scrutiny committee for education in Bradford has called for a new purpose-built emotional and behavioural difficulty school to be created in the district.

Under the current provision any teenager who is given a statement of emotional behavioural difficulties (EBD) is taken out of mainstream school and placed in Bradford's secondary pupil referral unit (PRU).

Ofsted criticised this system during an inspection of Bradford's secondary PRU.

But the inspection report praised the work of the PRU which is split across four sites.

The PRU caters for two types of pupil: those who have been permanently excluded from their school and those with emotional behavioural difficulties who have been taken out of mainstream education.

The pupils with emotional behavioural difficulties are currently placed at the PRU's Woodend centre in Shipley and Ellar Carr centre in Thackley.

The PRU also has two units at Jesse Street in Thornton and the Aireview Centre in Shipley which are for pupils who have been permanently excluded.

The Ofsted report praises the overall work of the PRU and says teaching and learning are good across all centres.

However it criticised Bradford Council and Education Bradford, the private firm which runs the district's education services, for not providing permanent school places for pupils with EBD.

The report says: "The local authority, as the appropriate authority, is failing some pupils because it does not have schools for pupils with behavioural, emotional and social difficulties.

"Some pupils have spent their entire secondary career in the PRU.

"This means they have not received their national curriculum entitlement because units are not resourced for long-stay pupils.

"In addition they have become increasingly unsettled because they have seen their classmates moved on."

Education Bradford is currently carrying out a review of the provision of education for pupils with EBD.

However it is not known if this review will look at the option of creating a new school.

Coun Carol Beardmore (Lib Dem, Eccleshill), who sits on Bradford Council's Young People and Education Improvement Committee has called for a specific EBD school to be created.

She said staff at the secondary PRU's were doing a fantastic job but she said she believed pupils with EBD would benefit from a specialist school.

"I think we will have an increasing number of pupils coming through who will need this kind of provision and a specialist school for secondary school pupil needs to be in place."