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
If you are interested in being put in contact with an education law specialist you could pm me and I would be happy to link the two of you up. It's a free service so nothing like that to worry about

Or if you didn't wish to talk to someone like that there is a very good national service that specialises in education matters for children with additional needs they have a helpline

www.ipsea.org.uk

I think it is pretty presumptuous to assume that I haven't back tracked through her life and to say that what I am saying is there has been no effect on her because of things to do with me and home. This thread was about school. Which is exactly why I talked about school and the things school have failed to do.

I'm sure you know that schools still have responsibilities re pupil's whose problems are exclusively due to home - to refer to proper support etc. They basically didn't do that. I referred to CAF, it was refused as not meeting the criteria because school said she had no issues at school, I contacted EWO to raise concerns about her attendance when it was still at 98% etc

She was really bad in reception, it peaked in y2, she got better and was I thought completely fine in y3, gradually got worse until the end of y4 when it really got very suddenly bad and the CAMHS assessment came back severe school anxiety.

That doesn't mean I think, and I certainly haven't said, that she has been unaffected by the MS and the DA and I have included all of it on the referrals and in the assessments but the people who have actually assessed her believe that her anxiety is largely based around school and her difficult experiences there....

But you know, I say I think they are not taking the DA seriously enough and that is interpreted as me blaming everything on school and not acknowledging how everything else has affected her which will hold back her recovery - don't you think that is exactly the reason why I have made sure the MS and the DA are included in the assessments and on the referrals?

I've spoken to coram needs and I feel pretty aware of our rights and options and spoken to a local law firm too. I don't think it would help things to take the legal route really at the moment because we have really actually just started to work better together between home and school. It is looking like she probably will get some tutoring reasonably soon too.

I think that what people with ASD need is stability and to be honest, from reading through some of your comments on other threads, I'm not sure you could argue that you've given her that throughout her 10 years.

You're right, of course, school do have responsibilities regardless of reasons but maybe her behaviours actually weren't as pronounced at school. School tends to be a very stable place where there's routine and consistency. Some children genuinely do have less issues there than at home. I honestly can't accept that multiple teachers over several years failed to spot clear signs of concerns. Maybe they genuinely weren't as apparent at school.
What you have now, it seems to me in my un-professional and limited opinion, is a scared little girl who just wants to be able to control her world- hence shrinking it to the size of her room.

And look TBH flowers you haven't got enough knowledge of everything that has happened with DD, if you really insist on believing that the only thing the school has done that is wrong is open the doors and that even that is ambiguous because they might have a good explanation then there is literally nothing that I could possibly say to change your mind and I don't need to justify myself to you. Education welfare, ed psych, speech and language, the paed, the social worker and her support worker all are recognising that school has done a number of things wrong over the whole time she has been at school which are able to be evidenced now and that have been linked by assessment by professionals to her problematic self esteem and her severe anxiety. Everyone knows everything about the whole picture so that they can use their professional judgement to provide her with the best help because I have made sure I have given everyone involved all of the information.

But hey from some of the story you've concluded that her anxiety about school is about being worried about me.... they must all be wrong....

They were apparent at school because school themselves came up with a great long list of all the problems they'd seen a teacher school since reception called the CIN meeting. Problems they had not raised with anyone until that point. They then filled in the assessments which came back the exact same issues at school and at home whilst saying they would not refer her because they saw no problems.

The fact is that for them to come up with a great long list of problems spanning her whole time at the school and which had never even been mentioned at the time means that they did know there were problems from reception onwards and they didn't do anything as basic as even talking to me about them.

What they did do on several occasions is punish her for sensory needs or communication problems.

I think that, with very limited knowledge of the situation, she has had a life that would have been tough on any child, let alone one with ASD tendencies.

Clearly the school have made some mistakes and it sounds like you're confident that they are starting to resolve these now. Confident enough to keep your younger children at the same school.

Sorry- presssed post too soon...

And hopefully confident enough to be able to work with them to get your daughter on track again.

My younger children and older child have no issues but the same home environment. That's partly why they are concluding it is mainly about school and how school have approached the whole issue generally and that she says to everyone that the problem is school and socialising (which yes is not always reliable). Plus I think people are concluding that partly because when the abuse was escalating and I was diagnosed with MS (the period of offences for which he has been arrested) she was getting much much better which was also when she had stopped going to school.

I think it sounds like your DD needs to be in a more specialist school. I don't think most mainstream schools are set up to cope with children with such complex needs.

Flowers that is a low blow.

That's horrible. At 13 you should be able to get up and go, no permission needed!

How embarrassing for the child! Not sure about the legality but surely human decency would let a child out of class to the toilet!! We all have times, for whatever reason, that we really need to 'go'. My daughter is 16. Her school has same policy...kids not allowed to go to toilet between classes so if they need to 'go' they need to ask out of class. My daughter is type 1 diabetic and her pastoral care teacher has given her a 'pass' so that she can be allowed to go to toilet whenever she asks. We have had very few issues in the 5 years she has been at high school so far.

At 13 you should be able to get up and go, no permission needed!

Is anyone, anyone at all, on this thread who is saying this is or similar, able to explain why safeguarding procedures just don't matter when a child needs the toilet? Why is it that I can be fired for leaving a group of 13 year olds unsupervised, or my school can be placed in special measures for not taking registers, having cameras, having gates to prevent intruders, having DBS checks on staff, but it is considered absolutely fine for any 13 year old to decide they are leaving the classroom and going (they say) to the toilet with no adult supervision?

Why are people being so obtuse about the implications of this?

I feel sorry for the child of course I do.

However the teacher is there to do a job. The teacher is a responsible adult who knows what they are doing. You don't know what had gone on in that classroom prior and the teacher probably made the best decision at the time it's just very unfortunate for the poor child who was probably the victim of miss judgment..

But think if you were that teacher, she probably feels bad too.

Because "trifle* people have no idea of the reality of life in a large comp.
they are comparing it to having a few children round their house for a play date.

I taught and i hated the school policy not to let kids go. I felt under pressure to deny them this basic human right.
And if they want to go and have a chat with their mates in the loos so what? Better than in my lesson!

And if they want to go and have a chat with their mates in the loos so what? Better than in my lesson!

Better than my lesson!

And safeguarding?

Because "trifle people have no idea of the reality of life in a large comp. they are comparing it to having a few children round their house for a play date.*

It did amuse me the other day when I posted a list of the less salubrious activities that could take place on a school site with no adult supervision that would endanger children, and all the posters who had engaged me earlier sloped off! I think I've left some chickpeas on the hob, must dash!

And if they want to go and have a chat with their mates in the loos so what? Better than in my lesson!

And if that same child is assaulted whilst out of the classroom? Who would then take the responsibility for that?

Yes, that's what the ed psych thinks and I agree that she does now. However we've gone from 'she has no issues' to 'she has always had the same issues' to 'she needs a specialist school'.

Normally what would happen in mainstream school is the class teacher would raise the issues with the parent when they happened, the school would put the child on the SEN register, they would put in some support through the SENCO, they would exhaust the support, the child would get an EHCP plan, the child would be able to go to a specialist school.

We can't access any of that because she was only put on the SEN register in January this year and the school have only commissioned the well being support and referred to speech and language, ed psych and OT in January this year even though the list of numerous issues they have had in school and the assessments they did in school are the same ASD traits in school and at home and they span her whole school career.

The action they took re the numerous incidents since she started was to punish her and keep it all secret.

I'm sure you can understand how that could result in a severe school phobia for a child with ASD.

Then she got institutionalised in hospital and didn't want to be at home at all. Wanted to be back at hospital where she felt they could stop her 'being bad' which is why she couldn't leave her bedroom, because she felt she was keeping us safe from her, she has progressed to coming out of her room and to now leaving the house to go to h's and sometimes to go out for a drive through hot chocolate with the wellbeing worker.

School told me to send in a letter to say I was home educating her, I said I wasn't going to do that because it's not in her best interests (ed psych agrees), they said they will have to phone EWO, so I said yes they really should be phoning EWO, EW department had not had a single contact with them by the time the attendance panel was held 3 months later and they didn't even turn up despite the wellbeing worker telling them they needed to go and them being invited.