THE firm that provided meals containing horsemeat to Edinburgh schoolchildren has apologised for not admitting earlier the products had been recalled.
Amey Built Environment waited three weeks before alerting Edinburgh City Council about the problem.
Frozen beef mince containing between 1% and 5% horsemeat was found in the shared kitchen of Pirniehall and St David's primary schools in the Pilton district of the capital.
Amey recalled the contaminated batch on March 8 after it was advised by its food supplier, 3663, it contained horsemeat.
However, the information was not passed to the council until March 27.
Subsequent investigations by the council found that mince from the same batch was supplied to Oxgangs, Craigroyston and Forthview primary schools and Braidburn School, for children with special needs.
A letter was sent to parents at the affected schools as swiftly as was practicable, advising them of the test results and reassuring them there was no risk to their children's health.
Gillian Duggan, managing director of Amey Built Environment, said: "Although checks confirmed no current stock of the contaminated meat in any of the premises, there has been an unfortunate and unacceptable lack of communication from Amey to the City of Edinburgh Council regarding this issue.
"This resulted in a delay in the council being able to notify parents. We at Amey are very sorry this issue has occurred, and for any distress caused to parents, who quite rightly expect high standards."
The company has also provided a list of meals containing beef mince which were on the menu at each school in the five-week period between February 3 and March 4 and which may have contained mince from the affected batch.
Councillor Paul Godzik, Edinburgh's education convener, said: "As soon as we became aware through our own tests that mince containing a small percentage of horsemeat had been supplied to a number of our schools, we immediately took action by contacting parents to let them know.
"We also checked each of the school kitchens to make sure there was no mince from this batch remaining. It was only after we raised the issue with Amey that they advised us this same batch had in fact been recalled by supplier 3663 on March 8. It is unacceptable that the council was not given this information immediately. Had we known on March 8, we could and would have alerted parents to this at that time."
The council has been criticised for using outside providers for food, rather than locally sourced products.
The meat was supplied by Buckinghamshire-based food wholesaler 3663 via the council's contractors, Amey.
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