Mother forced to get off bus for breastfeeding
A mother from Bristol, England was forced off of a bus, accused of being ‘indecent’ for breastfeeding her baby daughter.
Amy Wooten of Bristol, England was taking the 54 First Bristol bus home on Tuesday when her six-week-old baby daughter, Emily, became fussy. Reluctantly, Wooten decided to breast feed Emily on the busy bus.
This prompted a complaint from a passenger, and the driver asked Wooten to discontinue breastfeeding. When Wooten, 25, refused to stop, the driver kicked her off the bus despite rainy weather. She was forced to take a taxi the rest of the way home.
”I felt completely and utterly humiliated, because it was a packed bus — if I hadn’t fed her, Emily would have screamed and we would probably have had more complaints from people on the bus,” she told the Telegraph.
”I was showing a tiny bit of breast, but is it any different to showing your arm or your foot? I have really struggled breastfeeding Emily and had so many problems but was determined to do the right thing for her. It just makes you really reluctant to feed in public.”
The action came despite a national campaign that aims to encourage mothers to breastfeed. According to Nicki Symes of NHS Bristol, nearly 200 businesses in Bristol have adopted the policy, posting signs welcoming women who breastfeed. Bristol was also one of the first cities in the country to complete the first stage of UNICEF’s Baby Friendly initiative.
Bus operator First Bristol has since made an apology to Wooten, sending her flowers and gift vouchers. Karen Baxter, a spokesperson for the bus company, said the incident was unfortunate and staff would be given guidance to prevent similar incidents from occurring.
”We deeply regret the incident which was caused by one individual driver’s actions, and we have already expressed our sincere apologies to Ms. Wooten for the distress caused as a result of it,” Baxter told the Telegraph.
”We have launched an investigation into exactly what happened. As a company, we fully support a woman’s right to breastfeed in public and understand that when traveling with a small child it may be necessary to do this on the bus. We have already taken steps to ensure that this message is communicated to all of our staff.”
Harriet Harman, Minister for Women and Equality, commented on the situation saying: ‘I’m glad the bus company has apologised. This discrimination against breastfeeding mothers will be unlawful under the new Equality Bill currently going through parliament.”
The U.K.’s Equity Bill was first introduced to the House of Commons on April 24, 2009, and if passed, will provide numerous changes to help promote equality in the country.
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sue on Fri, 26th Feb 2010 1:05 pm
this is a shocker!!! so much so that there is now a facebook group going round calling for the sacking of the driver
Sack The Bus Driver Who Did This To A Breastfeeding Mum
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=361360580069&ref=ts
AJ on Sun, 28th Feb 2010 10:45 am
CCTV on the bus has shown that there was no incident (check out the Bristol Evening News article). She lied. Perhaps there will be a facebook campaign to get her prosecuted. If there had been no CCTV evidence, it would have been difficult for the driver to prove his innocence, and his reputation would have been ruined.
Yammy on Mon, 1st Mar 2010 6:04 pm
During an investigation launched by the company CCTV from the bus was subsequently examined and found to show that Miss Wootten was not forced off the vehicle in Wells Road by the driver as she claimed. The footage, seen by the Post, shows that driver, Rob Stone did not even speak to her during the journey along the 54 route on Tuesday and it shows the time she got off the bus and the location. Mr Stone, 55, told the Post that he noticed Miss Wootten breastfeeding when he looked in the mirror while driving along but did not say anything and heard nothing from any of the other passengers.
He said he even remembered lowering the vehicle to make it easier for the mother to get off the bus with the baby’s pram. Mr Stone, of Warmley, said: “It was a very ordinary journey. I have a laugh and joke with the passengers and know some of the people who get on and off, but I was not aware of any problem whatsoever. “I noticed her in the mirror as I was going up the Wells Road and it occurred to me that she was breastfeeding but no one complained about her. “A few people stopped to look or speak to the baby as they got off, but that was it.
“When we got to The Coots I pulled right up to the pavement and lowered the suspension like I do for women with pushchairs.” The first the former mental health worker knew of the complaint was when he got a call on Thursday morning asking him about the “incident” on the bus. Mr Stone, who also worked as a milkman in the 70s, said: “I knew it wasn’t right but I knew we would have the footage. My only concern was that it might not have been working.
“There was a mix of emotions and a little bit of stress but I felt relief that I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong. “I got into work early because I couldn’t really focus on anything else, but by then they knew I hadn’t done anything wrong.”
When the Post contacted First with Miss Wootten’s allegation on Wednesday the company was already aware of the alleged incident as she had contacted its customer services department. Before First could check the CCTV footage from the 54 bus Miss Wootten had travelled in on Tuesday, it needed to identify the vehicle and find a time when the vehicle was in a position for them to take the data from the hard drive. It then had to be downloaded and looked through.
At any time each bus’s hard drive can have up to a week’s worth of footage to trawl through. Justin Davis, managing director, First Bristol, Someset and Avon, said: “Having simultaneously received both a customer complaint and a media inquiry regarding an alleged incident we began an internal investigation – as is our normal policy. “Such investigations normally take a few days – to allow for staff to be formally interviewed, CCTV footage to be downloaded and other information sought.
“As a company that understands and accepts a woman’s right to breastfeed in public we found the allegation made by Ms Wootten to be shocking. However, working on the premise that the customer who had contacted us had a genuine complaint we immediately apologised for any possible distress caused. Due to the nature of the alleged incident we also sent some flowers by way of apology. We also made a statement to the Evening Post explaining what action we’d taken.” Mr Davies said that their footage showed no incident took place.
He said: “We have tried to make contact with Ms Wootten on several occasions to clarify the details of the incident and ask her to talk us through the journey while watching the CCTV footage, but she has refused all the opportunities to do so. “We feel in this case we must set the record straight, backing our driver and our own position as a company that supports a woman’s right to breastfeed. We hope that Ms Wootten will contact us to discuss the issue so that the matter can be completely resolved.”
Rachael Siegenberg on Tue, 2nd Mar 2010 1:07 am
Yes, she did lie. And for some reason the facebook group doesn’t exist anymore, its obviously been taken off.