Is it legal for a teacher to deny a child access to a toilet?

[NotTheMrMenAgain]

I have a friend whose DC, age 13, recently soiled themselves in class because the teacher repeatedly refused to allow them to go to the toilet (and were fairly dismissive about it, by the sound of it). It wasn't a small mishap - the rest of the class were dismissed and my friend called to collect DC.
Understandably, DC is mortified and horrified and my friend very upset and angry. There's been a verbal apology from the head of year to my friend, who said how upset the teacher involved was - but no apology from the teacher to the DC - the teacher had since ignored the child/incident.
AIBU to think this simply isn't good enough? My heart goes out to the poor kid, who knows what kind of mark it will leave and what sort of bullying/mockery it will set them up for.
Is it against a child's basic rights to deny them access to a toilet? It seems like cruelty to me. It this a common policy at secondary school? Apparently they aren't allowed to pop to the loo in between classes, only at break/lunch. When I was a teenager my periods were heavy and I wouldn't have made it til break without an accident!

Offred:

I don't get your point. Put it a simpler way: what do you think should happen when you approach the Head about a problem and he fails to resolve it to your satisfaction?

Because this has only happened after she has been out of school for months and because now most of the things that would normally be done are being impeded for two reasons - 1. The SENCO can't really help plan or assess because she doesn't know dd and only became involved after DD had been out of school for months (and the other assessments are difficult because she is out of school) and 2. Because no-one at any time from school has admitted responsibility for any failings on their part and no action is being taken by anyone to hold them to account. They can just decide not to attend things like the attendance panel and no-one says or does anything.

In this situation I would expect the head to open an investigation into what happened and report the conclusions to me and to the governors himself and admit failings if there were failings and apologise for said failings.

no action is being taken by anyone to hold them to account

You haven't informed the governing body! How are they meant to hold anyone to account?

Offred:

But that is the issue, isn't it? If the Head investigates and it turns out that you and he disagree on what constitutes a 'failing', i.e. he believes no-one has done anything wrong, then that is all he is obligated to say to you. "I believe we have met our statutory obligations in this case. Please raise this with the governors if you still aren't satisfied."

That is how accountability works.

You sound like you want him to automatically see it your way and do what you want. That isn't accountability. He isn't a performing monkey.

And more generally if the problem was 'I don't think little Jonny should get homework' it should be dealt with very differently than what happened with DD.

Do you actually think that a child who has DLA (the award letter I photocopied and gave to school along with all the assessments I filled in before I sent them and all the letters with results of assessments others had done) should be able to just get out onto the street without the say so of anyone responsible for safeguarding such as the therapist, teacher or SENCO?

Offred:

Why are you asking me whether I think your DD should be allowed to wander out into the street? What have I said that even hints at me believing that is acceptable?

I think you are being deliberately facetious. No-one has investigated. I asked them too, they said they had heard my concerns but there has not been an investigation for them to conclude whether what happened was reasonable or not. That's the whole point. It is not me who wants the head to just agree with me it is the head that has dismissed my request for an investigation by saying he has 'listened to' my concerns.

It was clearly something that should have been investigated because the speech and language therapist was pretty shocked it had been allowed to happen and asked me for a lot of detail about safeguarding issues at the school after.

Offred- you said that the head had assured you there would be some re training of staff. That's not just dismissing the issue is it?

Well you just said that the head's response by not investigating and palming me off was adequate and I wanted him to be a performing monkey and just agree with me. No, I want the school to investigate and when they have investigated explain to me what happened and that is all I asked them to do and they have not done that.

Offred:

I am not being even slightly facetious.

You are unhappy with his response, so report it upward. You seem to be happier moaning than taking action, but that isn't a lack of accountability, it is you failing to do what you can to make him accountable.

Definitely out now.

Then write a letter to the chair of governors expressing your concerns!

When did this happen by the way? You said your child had been absent for a long time? Is this a recent thing or was it a while ago?

When what I have asked is that they investigate what happened and explain it to me telling me they will refrain the staff is dismissing it. By just retraining the staff they can continue to plausibly deny that it ever happened because there will be no paper trail.

I have now had it minuted in a meeting so there now is a paper trail but still. If they investigated and identified any failings they would be able to prevent it happening again. If they just tell me they will train the staff then how do they even know what happened?

Would you think that was an adequate response from a primary school to this issue if it was your child?

Maybe the failing was your child being allowed out of class...

I've never said that schools are not accountable to anyone.

I have already explained that I am choosing to focus intense efforts on actually getting help for DD rather than trying to push forward with getting others above the school to hold the school to account.

It is fair enough to point that I am choosing that but TBH unless you are the person actually in this situation you don't know how it depletes your capacity to cope.

By telling you that they will retrain their staff they have absolutely admitted there was a problem though surely? They haven't tried to convince you that everything was in order have they?

What do you want them to do? Do you want the receptionist sacked?

To see speech and language for an assessment?

I'm wondering also what your child's version of events is? What does she say happened and was she able to tell you why she left?

But on her own, presumably?

Frankly, the school can't win here. 95% of children "wanting to go to the toilet" during lessons are doing it to get out of the lesson. Sadly, your child was in the 5%. Unfortunately, I can't think of a single law they have broken here. Were the school prenotified of any medical condition that would necessitate this ?

Imagine the safeguarding issues of an unescorted child wandering around the school on their own, out of a lesson. If something happened, naturally, the school would be blamed.

I've repeatedly said that what I wanted them to do was investigate what happened and tell me why it happened. That's all.

If having investigated it they found failings to maybe say they feel bad about it happening and if they found no failings to tell me why.

When I asked for that meeting to discuss it I opened the meeting with 'I understand what it is like when dd has a meltdown and how difficult it is to know what is the best thing to do and my other children have loved being at this school but...'

Some of you seem to just be assuming that clearly and obviously the school must be fine because it is a school and my experience with DD must be because I am a difficult parent. Having had this thrown at me for months and having it hold back any support for my extremely vulnerable daughter for a really unacceptable period of time while I convinced people that mattered that there was actually an issue with school and now finding it difficult to get the appropriate support for dd because the school have only recently decided to do anything is why I feel it is actually important that reasonable concerns from children and parents are listened to by schools.

At no point have I or would I ever support 'moaning' 'demanding a teacher's head' or expecting the head to 'just agree' with me or be a 'performing monkey'

Imagine the safeguarding issues of an unescorted child wandering around the school on their own, out of a lesson. If something happened, naturally, the school would be blamed.

Of course they would. They would be free to say they needed the toilet and then go God knows where - smoking behind some wall somewhere, leaving the school grounds, meeting someone from offsite, meeting another student for a fight, buying or selling drugs - there is no argument for it and posters here are breathtakingly credulous in my opinion.

With the speech and language therapist and the class TA who left her and the therapist in the cupboard for the assessment because it was a cupboard and was only physically big enough for two chairs. I haven't asked DD but I spoke in detail and at length with the therapist who thankfully followed her home to make sure she was safe and came in to talk to me.

Some of you seem to just be assuming that clearly and obviously the school must be fine because it is a school and my experience with DD must be because I am a difficult parent.

Truly, I think you sound very difficult. That doesn't mean I think they are in the right. Of course the incident with your DD should have been investigated. But as it wasn't, you needed to direct your concerns to the appropriate place. If you don't want to do that, that is your choice. But please referring to that as a lack of accountability to parents - you obviously have a limited understanding of the concept.

*stop referring