STAFF at schools in Ceredigion have been the subject of 22 allegations of causing harm to pupils in the last three years, a Freedom of Information request has revealed.

There were six such allegations in each of the 2014-15 and 2015-16 academic years, with the figure almost doubling to 10 such allegations in the 2016-17 academic year.

Ceredigion County Council was also asked whether the allegations were escalated as child protection concerns using the Multi Agency Referral Form (MARF).

The council said it had no data for 2014-15, and that the form was used three times in 2015-16, rising to eight times for 2016-17.

Asked for a breakdown of the allegations by school in the county, the council refused, claiming such detail could lead to the identification of the individuals concerned.

The council response states: “Due to the small number of cases per school we believe that disclosure of the names of the schools may lead to individuals being identifiable, therefore the name of the schools are exempt from disclosure under section 40 (2) of the FOI Act, which states that information is exempt from disclosure if it is personal data and its disclosure would breach any of the data protection principles in the Data Protection Act (DPA) 1998.”

Asked to clarify in what circumstances the MARF would be used, a council spokesperson said: “The Multi Agency Referral Form (MARF) is used to report child protection concerns, which include allegations against persons working with children; the document is currently used across the region, i.e. Dyfed-Powys.”