16month old son exclude from nursery for having food allergies

[surreyallerymum]

help.. I went to collect my son from nursery after a long day at work to find him sitting in the office of the nursery looking very upset.An area manager of the nursery was with my son(I had never seen her before) she proceeded to tell me she was excluding my son with immediate effect due to his food allergies and 'execzma'
(please excuse spelling).No warning nothing just there and then.As you can imagine it but mine and my partners job's under threat as we had no child care. I have written to the nursery to complain and to raise points. That they have other children in nursery with allergies.Why my son? They haven't really answered any of our questions. I have now been desperately trying to find legal help.. No where to find. No body wants our case I have been let down twice.. Do I have a case? does anyone have answers. I believe its break of contract? discrimination??

Agree with Riven, they simply cannot do that. Maybe go to the CAB and see if someone there can help you. It sounds very odd. Surely when you enrolled your DS you would have completed medical forms so they would have known about it?

riven ramadan kareem, bukra inshaallah

Anaphylaxis Campaign is an organization who know all about allergies and the statutory obligations a school has in regards to your DC.

here

Contact them directly if you need direct help. They are really kind and helpful.

Good luck

Someone brought up something similar on the allergies board a while ago. I think the general conclusion was that it did not class as disability discrimination because food allergies didn't count as a disability.

However, the nursery my ds1 went to made it very difficult for us to be able to leave ds2 there (ds2 is anaphylatic for dairy). We didn't fight them on it though.

Sorry that probably doesn't help much. However, I'd be interested to know if you can bring anything against them discrimination-wise.

I would report it to OFSTED. Whether having a food allergy is a disablity is not the point, it is certainly a special needs. By law nurseries that get foundation stage funding have to cater for special needs.

You could also report them to social services. What they did to your son was psyschological abuse. Its not as if allergies and ezcema are life threatening and catching.

If you can't get compensation then screw their business.

If they excluded your son with immediate affect then they are breaking the contract. You cannot expel a 16 month old baby for something which is not his fault. They knew the deal when they took him on.

Have they breeched their contract. Surely there is a notice period and if they have not given you notice then you are in your rights to sue for additional expenses incurred and emotional upset.

CAB are excellent and they will give you legal advice.

Thank you all for replying.. I've had a semi productive day.. Took on your advice and called anaphalatic society.. They were helpful and put me in contact with the childrens law centre.. Who were really helpful.. UNTIL i mentioned the nursery were privately owned.. after this the tone changed.. Nothing i can do unless i can find a solicitor to take the case on as Break of CONTRACT not discrmination..I have alreay done this and contacted a couple of local firms..no one was prepapared to take case on.. Im going to be back on the case tomo. Thank you again all for all your comments and helpful suggestions.. I dont want to give up.. There has to be help somewhere.Everyones shocked when we tell them but no one wants to take the case on its crazy

Eczema is a disability though even if food allegies aren't

Try Ofsted. They can investigate after a complaint (you are making a complaint?). Its logged on the website as a written response to a complaint so other prospective parents might see it and wonder what it was about.

Also make sure you tell every other mummy you know, contact your local NCT to make sure all their mummies know what a useless waste of space the nursery is.

Or try the local paper.It would make a great story/headline for them.... especially if accompanied by a picture of your sad toddler excluded because of eczema.... and that should really shaft them.

Enjoy your revenge.

And frankly they sound like a bunch of muppets you wouldn't want to leave your child with, so you are better off with another (any other?) nursery/nanny/child minder.

To reallytired.. Thank you for all your helpful hints.. Ive already contacted OFSTED.. to be honest they didnt seem totally
helpful kept repeating they could not get involves in contracts..CAB also semmed to think they were in their rights because they were privately owned.. social services were involved just after xmas as he a pulled elbow which happened at the nursery. again drew a blank their.. Banging my head against a wall.. we are trying so hard to just get a little justice.. its not the money.. its the @' how dare you'

cake faced.. Thank you for your message all those ahve gone through my mind.. The sad thing is i work in the school opposite the nursery.. a lot of parents who go tothe school also use the nursery.. great i hear you cry.. but dont think my senior management cld cope.. it was one of the first things thatwent through my mind the night it happened.. just want to name and shame them.. want them to feel as humilated as i did

surreyallerymum, I empathise. DS1 has an egg allergy and at his nursery, his keyworker allowed him to make cakes with eggs. (She didn't realise that am allergy meant no contact, not just no ingestion, though she excluded another allergic child from the same activity ). The nursery were useless. Ofsed were useless, the local authority were useless.

All the nursery were bothered about was how "upset" the nursery worker was (never mind how upset I was that they put my child into danger!). I emailed the local authority and they called me back, but my mobile was switched off at the time as I was teaching (university lecturer) - I couldn't get in touch with them again later, despite numerous attempts. Ofsted had to be informed by the nursery (legal requirement), but all they said was that the nursery had revised their allergy policy and would keep their registration.

When we were looking for a nursery for ds2 (dairy allergic), they waited 2 days before he was due to start and said they didn't have the procedures in place to ensure a safe environment for him (and then denied they were excluding him on the basis of allergy .

The problem seems to be that allergies are not something Ofsted concern themselves with, but it falls between the cracks disability-wise too.

Also, parents of non-allergic children tend to think it is all fuss about nothing/hyper-protective parents or some such. So, when I told other parents I knew, only those with other allergic children were in the least bit concerned. Even they were of the opinion "oh that's worrying, my dc has also been given more piriton in the last couple of months", but tbh the convenience of on-site nursery in my case seemed to outweigh any concerns from parents.

The fact that they were a big chain meant they could bluff their way through the Ofsted stuff.

I don't have any answers, but it sucks.

My dp had to give up his (good) job to stay home and look after ds2 because we didn't have alternative childcare arrangements in place .

I cant beleive there are so many of you relpying.. Im really tearful today.. I have felt so alone in this fight for the last two months.. Am shocked their are others in this poisiton.. It MAKES ME FEEL SO MUCH BETTER.. Thank you.. Ive just had my morning argument with ofsted.. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! THE WOMAN WAS ON REPEAT. The nusery according to her had done nothing wrong. I work in a school i put it to her if i had dobe the same thing at the school what would ofsteds response be then.. Amazingly she didnt answer and went back to orginal answer of the 'my child welfare was not at risk' I often wonder what would of happened if i decided in that day that i was taking him out no warning nothing.. I almost sure i would be in court now. BREAK OF CONTRACT. I will def try the company you suggested thank you.Going to have a nice day with the kids today, come back with a more poisitive attitude tomo.. I so desperate to win this.. not just for me anf my son but for all you helpful people too..

Have you tried contacting the Equality and Human Rights Commission to see if they can clarify regarding allergies and disability discrimination.

Last resort could be your MP?

In a different context (employment) I have taken specialist professional advice from a barrister who deals with a lot of disability discrimination cases on whether the DDA applies to allergy. His view which I shared was that allergies don't easily fall under the disability discrimination act,although the effects might. You have to look at what the effect of the allergy would be without treatment. Which is how the DDA works - you look at the condition in an uncontrolled way. Treatment could arguably include avoidance of the allergen. If that would cause a disability there might be an argument. So for example if an allergen would cause asthma then that could be covered, but you'd need a lot of medical evidence to show cause and effect.

The next issue if the DDA improperly implements the underlying european law as uk law expressly excludes at least hayfever (as an allergy) but the european law doesn't. If the nursery was publicaly funded european law could apply but as its private it can't.

There is a breach of contract claim and at the very least you should be able to claim all losses which flow from them not giving you notice - which can be loss of your earnings if you can prove it.

When I looked at this (before I was on mat leave) it was unchartered waters and there were no cases about allergy and the DDA that I or the barrister found. Things may have changed since.

I know this is not what you want to hear and probably not fair but in an employment context it could be fair to fire someone if an organisation cannot avoid the allergen (and have tried) provided they do so properly. I don't know about nurseries or education but if it was analogous there could be difficulties.

From a purely legal perspective I would also add that if you do fight it will be difficult and expensive so do try to get your MP behind you as well as one of the allergy charities or equality commission.

Good luck