Chippenham mum in baby change row

4:54pm Thursday 13th November 2008

Comments (13)   Have your say »

Mum Caren Peters-Horton was shocked when staff at a pub asked her to leave after a row broke out when she changed her baby’s nappy.

Dr Peters-Horton, a research scientist and mum to 16-month-old Phoenix, was having lunch with friends in The Old Lane pub on Pewsham estate in Chippenham.

She needed to change her son’s nappy and, although the pub claimed to have changing facilities, Dr Peters-Horton disagreed and resorted to changing her son on the conservatory floor.

She was later asked to leave the pub and is upset at the way she was treated but a spokesman for the pub said: “The manager has a duty to all customers to ensure they enjoy their visit to the pub.

“On this occasion the customer chose to change their baby’s dirty nappy on the floor of the pub’s dining area, next to groups of customers eating meals, leading to two separate groups – eight people in total – making a complaint and subsequently leaving the pub before finishing their meals.

“At this time the manager politely asked the customer to change their baby in a quieter area of the pub away from people eating, or in the disabled toilets which is a large, clean space often used by parents with babies and young children.”

But Dr Peters-Horton of Queen’s Crescent said: “I wasn’t prepared to go to their changing facilities, which consisted of a disabled toilet and the only place to change him would have been on the floor.

“So I went to change him in the conservatory which was empty, I wouldn’t have done it anywhere near people eating or drinking.”

Dr Peters-Horton, of Queen’s Crescent, said she had almost finished changing him when the manager came in and asked her to use the baby changing facilities.

She added: “I understood why the manager was asking me to move out of the conservatory but I explained to her that I was not prepared to change my child on the floor of a toilet.

“I have been going to this pub for over a year now and ever since I first came I have been asking them to put in proper baby changing facilities as they say they are a child friendly establishment.”

After changing Phoenix she went back to the table with her friends and voiced her concern about the way she was treated when the manager came over a second time to ask her to leave.