Back in 2009, this newspaper reported that more than 500 Bradford Council buildings – including 205 schools – contained asbestos.

Asbestos is an emotive subject, and a substance that causes a lot of fear – quite rightly, for the numbers of deaths it has caused – among people. One of the main teaching unions called for asbestos to be removed from all school premises at the time.

The approach then was to “manage” asbestos – the Health and Safety Executive was of the opinion that so long as the asbestos was not disturbed, it posed little risk. That does little, however, to reassure teachers who work in the schools and parents who send their children there every day.

A new development has once again drawn the ire of the unions, this time over plans to devolve all health and safety management in schools to the boards of governors from local authorities – effectively dropping the hot potato of asbestos right in the schools’ laps.

Governors are generally volunteers who give their time and effort freely to help the school in their particular community and it does seem, as the unions say, that giving the ultimate responsibility for the health and safety of staff and pupils to boards of governors is a step too far.

That is in no way denigrating governors – they are, without doubt, dedicated and enthusiastic people with a strong sense of community spirit.

But something as important as this should, surely, be dealt with by experts. Shuffling the problem of asbestos around will not make it go away, and for the sake of our children and those who work in our schools, this is something that should be tackled head on at the highest level.