A rat infestation that led to the cancelation of a North Wales secondary school’s Christmas concert has now forced an early closure for the rest of term.

Eirias High School in Colwyn Bay has been closed since Friday while children learn from home according to Head teacher, Sarah Sutton said further cleaning is required and pupils will return to school on Tuesday 10 January.

In a letter to parents, Sarah Sutton confirmed that the school will now remain closed until after the Christmas holidays.

This is to allow the building to be industrially cleaned after “enhanced eradication methods” were deployed and to ensure classrooms are safe.

“Working in conjunction with pest control experts, an industrial cleaner and the local authority, we took the decision to vacate staff and learners from these classrooms and re-accommodate elsewhere in the building.

“We were at that point confident that there was no further activity across the school.

“The view of the experts was that any issue with rodents was greatly exacerbated by the cold weather.”

But last Thursday the school uncovered “suspected rodent activity in a separate area of the building” so, the school “took the decision to revert to online learning for the period of Friday 16th December and Monday 19th December,” she added.