Can they insist I leave my bf baby all day?

[dollshouse]

Apologies for the rubbish name; I'm a regular but do not want to be identified.
anyway, my problem is that I have been called for jury service and am panicking about what I am supposed to do about my excl bf baby (6mo) if I do it? Will/Can they make me do it? This is really stressing me out and of course, I cannot phone anyone to ask until Monday. And what am I supposed to do with baby all day? I am currently on maternity leave.

You can ask for a deferment because you're currently breastfeeding and can't leave your child, and they'll grant it. Don't fret about it, it's pretty common.

I would imagine that if you need to be with your baby for feeding purposes that would be a sufficient reason for you to be excused jury service. They won't make you do it.

See here

You can ask for this jury service to be put on but you will probably be called again.
They won't make you leave a baby and often older toddlers/pre-school aged as well because although they can cover fees for childcare it's not always possible to find it so don't worry but be prepared to be called again at a later date.

They will let you defer, don't worry.

They let people off for holidays and all sorts.

I asked for an excusal due to small children and being pg and got it

I was in exactly your shoes a couple of months ago. I also didn't want to leave my baby (10 months) as I have no child care and was worried about feeding. I wrote asking to be excused (didn't want to defer in case I got called again) and it was no problem at all. Hope you get it sorted out and can relax over the weekend.

Phew, thanks, I have been really het up over this, having got over some blips with my bf. The lady I spoke to was very abrupt and not at all reassuring. I will phone the number she gave me on Monday and try to stay calm!

I was actually back at work when they sent me the "pre" call, asking for dates of holidays etc: I gave them plus told the that I was currently exclusively beasfeeding my ds (they had tried to call me the year before and I had told them that a) my grace period from my previous stint of jury service wan't up until Ausgust and that I would having ds in September )...

.... so they would need to supply me with facilities to express and somewhere to store the EBM.

.....surprisingly, they didn't call me

I did get called a couple of years later.

Its not a rubbish name.

i wrote a letter saying that i had a baby and was BF and therefore couldn't be away from the baby at the moment and they wrote back saying that I didn't have to do it. In fact it wasn't even deferred, it was something else even more not do-it-y IYSWIM

i didn't go into how old the baby was and when I had introduced solids and feeding times and stuff like that, I did to start with then realised they wouldn't care about details, they wouldnt ask a BF mother to spend her days in a court. So I just wrote that i was BF a baby

sorry, thedollshouse. I couldn't think of a name and just wrote the first thing I saw in our living room!

I will draft my letter over the weekend.

I suppose, as Dh pointed out, they must get fed up of people not wanting to do it. I am fed up of unhelpful people today though! This is not the end of the week I needed after a crap week.
Thanks all, for your help.
The dollshouse, you can have your name back now

Yes that was it, excusing not deferring. That was what I got as well.

The woman i spoke to was quite unhelpful too she just said "fill the form in and send it back" in a very dismissive, unsympathetic manner. She did not give me any reassurance that it would be OK IYSWIM

I was excused when I was about to start my teacher training (12 years ago) and have never been recalled. I sometimes wonder if they don't like me any more . Having said that, I now have a bf 9mo DD so wouoldn't be able to go now either!