Aibu to complain to brownies leader

[Mummytoonlychild]

My daughter is back to brownies next week and I've just been informed that she is not allowed to have a drink or go the toilet when she is there. It's a 90 mins session aibu to say she's a child and should be able to drink her own drink or go the loo when she needs to or am I being ott

Access to a toilet is absolutely a human right
Maybe, but not constantly. Plenty of workplaces and schools ask children and adults to wait until break or lunch time to go to the toilet.

I wonder if you've ever told your child they need to hold their bladders for 10 minutes until you get to the next service station? I hope you have never gone for a walk somewhere without toilets and expected them to wait until you got somewhere suitable to go? Or been in a queue at a theme park and waited until after the ride to find the toilets.

I guess some people just let their kids drop their pants and piss all over the street or pavement as they can't possibly breach their human rights by asking them to wait.

@DockOTheBay

Access to a toilet is absolutely a human right Maybe, but not constantly. Plenty of workplaces and schools ask children and adults to wait until break or lunch time to go to the toilet.

I wonder if you've ever told your child they need to hold their bladders for 10 minutes until you get to the next service station? I hope you have never gone for a walk somewhere without toilets and expected them to wait until you got somewhere suitable to go? Or been in a queue at a theme park and waited until after the ride to find the toilets.

I guess some people just let their kids drop their pants and piss all over the street or pavement as they can't possibly breach their human rights by asking them to wait.

Only bad schools and bad workplaces limit access unless there are genuine care/safety reasons.

The rest of this post is just

"Only bad schools and bad workplaces limit access unless there are genuine care/safety reasons."

Or the church hall that the brownies hire has insisted on them cleaning the toilets and kitchen at the end of the session. As volunteers, they'd rather not so are asking parents to support them in order to keep the sessions open. Personally, I'd try it to see how it works in practice before complaining.

@Nocutenamesleft

What?!?!

My daughter has a kidney issue and couldn’t not drink for 90 mins.

Goodness that’s going to exclude her from a lot of activities in the future.

How often do you set the alarm to go off overnight so she can wake up and drink?

@JuergenSchwarzwald

Why are people saying you need to clean the loos between each use? How do service areas, shops, pubs etc manage? They're not cleaning the loos every time. I doubt they are in schools, either. Who makes up these ludicrous rules?

However, I completely understand that if you are meeting outside you can't use loos and at that age 90 minutes should be manageable.

That's what I was thinking. I've used any number of public loos in the last two years, without anyone cleaning then between me and the next user.

What a bizarre rule. If leaders are being told they need to do this, they need to challenge it. There is absolutely no sense to it at all, and children's welfare should come before a nonsensical rule.

@CelestiaNoctis

That's literally a human right. My 6 year old couldn't go. She's fine with the toilet but if she did have to go she wouldn't be able to hold it for that long, no way.

That's Ok though. Girls start Brownies at 7. Perhaps she'll have developed a stronger bladder by then!

How do you manage on long car journeys/cinema/walks/shopping/traffic queues/beach and all the other places where toilets aren't immediately accessible?

@MrsWinters

I’d guess that volunteers are happy to give up their own time to run the session, but have been asked to clean the loos after if they’ve been used and don’t want to have to do this. Why not offer a parents rota to clean the loos and kitchen after the session do the girls can have a drink and use the loo?

I tried to instigate this. Most parents were horrified, some questioned what they were paying me for (!!!!!), but we masted to get a toilet rota. It lasted 2 weeks.

It'll be a batshit risk-assessment filler from the venue. Unfortunately the people who tend to be avaliable to manage these kinds of venues also correlates strongly into the demographic who were terrified into being extremely risk averse in 2020. Many youth groups couldn't return when official guidance allowed because of extra layers of impracticality (or outright closure) of these venues.

On threads about restrictions posters respond with "what restrictions?" there are so many layers of these ridiculous, unnecessary rules/ complications making life difficult that feed off the back of the official guidence/ rules from government, then The Youth Association, then individual units/ venues all competing to the ludicrous fallacy of being "Covid Secure"

The extra annoying feature is while it's easy to say "close/ restrict" the toilets, the actual better measures are more likely to be overlooked like using doors/ windows to ventilate, or managing parents outside rather than bringing them in assuming that an unregulated face covering will make much difference.

Don't complain to the unit, but it is worth a polite enquiry. Contact with the venue to let them know that such a measure is of disproportionate public health risk/ benefit and outdated advice could be worthwhile.

*My child at the same type of organisation. During Covid when they met they were told to bring their own bottle of water, but with meetings outside no toilet for the hour. Went before hand.

What annoyed me about the leader is that she took five of them to the theatre... They were not offered toilet before the show, at interval had to stay in their seat and were given drinks and not offered toilet then or afterwards, my child came out and was bursting! I asked why he didn't go loo and leader did not give them opportunity. Under her care for about 3-4 hours. I thought that was unacceptable*

‘Given opportunity’ surely you teach your child to let an adult who is caring for them know when they need the toilet?

What annoyed me about the leader is that she took five of them to the theatre... They were not offered toilet before the show, at interval had to stay in their seat and were given drinks and not offered toilet then or afterwards, my child came out and was bursting! I asked why he didn't go loo and leader did not give them opportunity. Under her care for about 3-4 hours. I thought that was unacceptable

Given opportunity surely you teach your child to let an adult who is caring for them know when they need the toilet?

Why are we still talking about bleaching and disinfecting rooms when this virus is primarily spread by droplets and is airborne? Someone isn't going to catch it because you used to loo yesterday.

Re: theatre trip I disagree. Surely it's better for the leader to ask if any kids need the toilet during appropriate moments, i.e. the interval. Otherwise she could have been in/out during the whole show and she wouldn't be able to escort on her own but take another adult, so two adults wanting to watch the show would be interrupted as well as interrupting everyone to move in the row. Otherwise some of those kids are going 5 plus hours without a toilet break. And kids sometimes don't think will they or will they not need a toilet in the next hour.

We dont know how old the kids taken to the theatre were. Given there was just one adult, I suspect they were over 12 years old. I absolutely would expect a child in secondary school to be able to say if they need to go to the toilet.

I worked on a factory production line as a student and we had designated 10 min breaks one after each other. You stuck to time or last woman missed her break. It was a safety issue line kept running constantly. You definitely couldn’t just walk off to loo.

All those saying you need to push back against unreasonable hall rules it’s just not realistic. I’d describe relationship as tolerated. Quite often groups rely on cheaper community rates to be able to operate. The people running the halls are often older or vulnerable so are very cautious re covid. Other hall users are elderly or pregnant mums so again they are very keen to protect them. A Brownies or Guides is a nice extra but down priority list to a pensioners lunch club or preschool. We pay £20 a week and half if not using hall. It’s viable on normal numbers but post covid we are down to a handful of girls.

To those saying employers don't limit toilet breaks this happens in many places eg teachers, operating theatres, etc where it isn't possible to just drop everything and go.

Oh that would have upset me too. I do understand why the rule has been made, it seems like it's another COVID related loss 😢

I am amazed that some people don't realise many employers limit and dictate toilet breaks. It applies to many many people and is not that unusual. Sometimes because of the job - your bus driver isn't parking up at a cafe whenever they want to go to the toilet - and sometimes because of the employer being a control freak.
Mumsnet has taught me that some middle-class people have zero idea how other people in this country live.

[quote AsYouWishButtercup]@RoyalFamilyFan in all my years I have never heard of an employer that makes grown working adults hold it in to a designated time. Who are these employers? Do they run gulags?[/quote]
You probably won't have heard of them, they're tiny companies like Royal Mail, Xxxx Academy Trust, xxxx Secondary School, Xxxx Primary School. Xxxx train company, Xxxx transport. Sainsbury's, Tesco, Asda, Waitrose, Xxxx insurance, Xxxx telecom.

Even civil service roles that require client contact or are lower grades can't leave their work station whenever they feel like it - reception, security, etc. And whilst you may be a senior manager at your employer and can go wherever you like, the equivalent staff at your company have the same restrictions.

I remember one of those American undercover boss shows where a female bin lorry driver was using a big metal coffee tin as a loo - the boss was dumbstruck but realised the drivers didn’t have breaks in their schedule.
Why is the first response to complain. I honestly can’t understand attitude. You are probably paying equivalent of £2 or £3 a week for 90 mins child free and that includes activities that cost money eg they bring home craft or cakes etc. If they are taken on a trip you are just paying entry fee (often a reduced rate for groups) but getting several hours free childcare. If you have an issue just speak to leader. We are lucky most of our parents are lovely. But all it takes is one email and you think why do I bother.

The book Nickel and Dime is about doing low paid jobs in the US. One of the outcries, when it was published, was from middle-class people horrified that for many low people, getting breaks or permission to go to the toilet was a real issue. From what I read low paid workers were equally horrified that middle-class people didn't realise this was totally normal for many workers.

AsYouWishButtercup

@RoyalFamilyFan in all my years I have never heard of an employer that makes grown working adults hold it in to a designated time. Who are these employers? Do they run gulags?

Amazon warehouse workers and um, yes?

Access to toilets as a human right, sure. Access to Brownies is not a human right.

I guess OP could start their own Brownie pack and run theirs on different rules so that her daughter or anyone else's can visit the toilet as often as they want.

@lottiegarbanzo

AsYouWishButtercup

@RoyalFamilyFan in all my years I have never heard of an employer that makes grown working adults hold it in to a designated time. Who are these employers? Do they run gulags?

Amazon warehouse workers and um, yes?

Anyone who works alone on Reception?

@lottiegarbanzo I worked for a call centre that did this. I know not all call centres do. Also Bernard Mathews factory. And in a toy shop and a nursery.
I am surprised you are gobsmacked.

I am not. I was quoting another poster.