School conducted a LFT on my son, against my consent

[duckme]

We received an email from our school to say that, due to the increase in covid cases, they are going to resume the LFT scheme in school (secondary) rather than at home. They sent an online consent form for parents to complete. I declined consent. I marked the form as such and sent it back electronically. My son was actually isolating until today as his bubble had burst, but I reminded him that he didn't have consent for the tests so he wasn't to have one. I know mistakes can happen and forms can be misplaced so I wanted to make sure he was fully aware of my consent.
He came home today and informed me that he had the test.
He said the whole class was called the the hall. The lady could see on the list that he hasn't got consent and asked him about it. He repeated what I had told him, 'my mom said, I'm not to have one'. The lady then proceeded to lecture him about protecting his family and friends. He is 13 and gave in to the person of authority in front of him. Despite them having explicit instructions to the contrary.
AIBU in being absolutely livid? That person ignored written consent, ignored the verbal consent of my son and then guilted him into having an invasive test.
I'll be contacting the school tomorrow to complain but I'd like to know if my covid fatigue is making me over react a little. But I can't imagine it being ok for a school to override parental consent in this way pre covid! Have we all surrendered all our our rights now? Even our parental ones?

The 'He is Gillick competent' argument is not correct as the OP's son was influenced into taking the test, this goes against the Gillick competency guidelines.

What are the disadvantages of a LFT? Assuming no special needs which makes a nose/throat swab difficult?

thatisschocking Yes they do and plenty others. Its fucking crazy.

@Maggiesfarm it's not going to hurt - really? I do pre-assesment Covid tests on patients daily and believe me for some people it really hurts!

Can activate gag reflex quite a lot in some people which is very unpleasant.

@thatisschocking

After the age of 13 the child's consent overrides the parents. This is not new at all can you provide a link to the legal provision you are referring to here?

The Gillick judgment found..

parental right yields to the child's right to make his own decisions when he reaches a sufficient understanding and intelligence to be capable of making up his own mind on the matter requiring decision.

A few links for you

learning.nspcc.org.uk/child-protection-system/gillick-competence-fraser-guidelines#article-top

www.cqc.org.uk/guidance-providers/gps/gp-mythbuster-8-gillick-competency-fraser-guidelines

Parents don't fucking own their kids. Once the child has sufficient understanding, it's for the child to decide how they look after their own body.

As long as they freely consent and aren't coerced or shamed into giving their consent.

My own child refused to give consent to have LFTs at school. This was back in January (and ended up in March) when they first rolled it out for secondary schools. My son has some MH issues which meant he didn't want to do the test with a stranger.

Personally, I didn't really agree with with the way the tests were done. I read the Birmingham uni report about how unreliable the tests were, I had concerns about non-medically trained volunteers administering the tests and I had issues with schools been left to organise the logistics of testing thousands of students with almost no support, no funding and the most pathetic training. So you could say I'm against LFT testing in schools and I didn't want to support the programme. Not strongly enough to try to dissuade my own child, though, but when he said he didn't want to do it at school, I was happy to refuse to give my consent.

Just giving some examples as to why some parents might refuse consent for LFTs. We do LFTs at home.

I'd be furious if school did something without my consent, or used peer pressure to convince my child to go against his original wishes.

Yanbu. It doesn't actually matter what the consent was for. What matters is you didn't give it and that that decision wasn't upheld or respected. What is the point in consent otherwise

OP: The lady then proceeded to lecture him about protecting his family and friends.

Gillick competency Sufficient time for the assessment must be allowed by the health professional who needs to be satisfied that a child has fully understood the nature and consequences of the [proposed treatment] and is mature enough to take account of broader health and social factors when making their decision

Yeah...I don't think anyone can start bleating about Gillick.

@CoopsMalloops

YANBU. I would be incandescent.

This thread is shocking, covid has broken peoples brains.

It really has. I am totally pro kids getting tested at school. I'd have it done every day if I could. But if a school sends out a consent form, then it should abide by the response, whatever it's for.

A 13-year-old shouldn't be railroaded into a decision by a bad-tempered member of staff in front of his peers. And 99% of MNers would agree if it was their kid, and the event not Covid related.

School should not over ride your lack of consent.
But your son can over ride your lack of consent.
Seems interesting to me that his response wasn’t, “I don’t want to” but “mum said no”.

I’d have to be a witness to the conversation to decide whether it was coercion, or the opportunity to do what he wanted rather than what you wanted. Especially as he seems to have zero objection to them - just that he only wanted to do them for a break from class.

Are you sure he didn’t happily consent without coercion?

You are saying that you think a teen shoudl be able to decide whehter to do LFT and because you think this, any parent who disagrees is wrong?

Any teen with sufficient understanding (I.e. the vast majority) is legally entitled to decide for themselves whether to do a LFT. Parents do not own their kids, and cannot dictate what medical treatment a teenager does or doesn't consent to.

@NursieBernard

The 'He is Gillick competent' argument is not correct as the OP's son was influenced into taking the test, this goes against the Gillick competency guidelines.

Well that would come out if it was investigated. If the son felt like a wander down to the test with his mates he might have felt bad telling his mum so embroidered it a bit. Stories do grow in the telling, I used to work in HR and the number of times I've heard, "You gave soandso a terrible bollocking then." When actually I'd had them in for a quiet chat to find out if there was a problem.

@thatisschocking yes, as a parent of a 13 year old (with some special needs) I think it is her decision whether she does a nose swab. Why wouldn't I?

Good lord. Why not ask the school nicely what happened. Maybe your son saw some sense in what the teacher said. Maybe a gazillion other things could have happened which you don’t know about. Maybe someone made a mistake. In any event these people are your sons teachers not “the enemy” and you seem to have lost sight of that in your righteous indignation.

You're conflating this issue with Covid and the truth is that schools have always asked pupils of your son's age if they consent regardless of whether parents do or not. Schools obviously consider DCs of 13 to be Gillick competent. It sounds as though your son said you had told him to say no. Hence the nurse gave him information and asked him to make a decision. He chose to have it.
I'm not disagreeing that there was an element of peer pressure by taking all the DCs to the hall; and I'm not arguing that the nurse probably presented a one-sided view which didn't take into account everything you had considered but this isn't about Covid or LFTs. It's a common tactic used in school vaccination programmes. If you're going to complain, be clear that your DS said he disagreed (not that you disagreed) and focus on the issue on informed consent. Otherwise you risk sounding like a Covid denier and that isn't relevant to consent processes.

I wouldn't even care if school asked my permission.

The kid sticks the swan up their own nose. Their choice.

I would explain to my da why it was being done but at 13 would expect them to make their own decision whatever I said.

The same as when parents give consent for HPV vaccine etc. If child refuses then school cannot force them.

Couldn’t care less if your family has decided not to participate in LFTs. As long as you also do not participate in sending him to school untested and potentially infect someone else who is happy to use what limited tools we have to protect people. Yes some are vaccinated, not all and it doesn’t always make a difference anyway.
You are perfectly free to make that selfish decision as a family. Therefore please remain as family well away from those who actually care about other people.

@duckme did you discuss this with you son before you returned the consent letter, what did he say?

@Allington

What are the disadvantages of a LFT? Assuming no special needs which makes a nose/throat swab difficult?

Your massively missing the point because your so fixated on covid your not seeing the wider issue.

The issue here was that no consent was given.

it could have been for ear piercing, tattoo, drink a spoon of vinegar, anything - his parent said no.

The school decided they didn't give a shit what the parent thought and went a head.This is a massive over reach.

We have pushed through so many civil rights boundaries in the name of the 'greater good' that we can't claw them back.YOU might be happy to do that but plenty of us are not.

YABVVVU!!
Ok for everyone else to have it though eh?!! Hypocritical and selfish to boot!
You one of those parents?!!

I don't think we can put much store in what the "lecture" from the school consisted of - could have been a half hour rant or a comment about how everyone doing the tests will help protect other people. We don't know.

@ForeverSausages

Apparently Gillick competency is being used with regards to LFT's. This is actually quite concerning. So my 6 year old could be coerced in school to have an LFT and that would be perfectly okay & legal? (We do them at home but he has SEN and would really very upset at having to do them at school).

No, because Gillick Competency specifically outlaws coercion and undue pressure.

@Clangerschick

Couldn’t care less if your family has decided not to participate in LFTs. As long as you also do not participate in sending him to school untested and potentially infect someone else who is happy to use what limited tools we have to protect people. Yes some are vaccinated, not all and it doesn’t always make a difference anyway. You are perfectly free to make that selfish decision as a family. Therefore please remain as family well away from those who actually care about other people.

I presume that's similar to the speech OP's son got.

@NursieBernard

The 'He is Gillick competent' argument is not correct as the OP's son was influenced into taking the test, this goes against the Gillick competency guidelines.

Or had he been nfluenced into ‘not’ taking the test at home? We only have the OPs very biased opinion. Would be very interesting to hear her sons version of events and that of the school staff.