Derbyshire schoolboy forced to wet himself after being refused toilet break during lesson

Rochelle Tatnell, 47, from Renishaw, said staff at Eckington School should be ashamed of themselves after leaving her son no other option but to wet himself simply because he ran out of time to use the toilet during break time.

The schoolboy has Development Coordination Disorder (DCD) – often known as dyspraxia – which causes a child to perform lower than expected in daily activities for their age and appear to move clumsily.

He struggles to perform common, everyday tasks, such as getting dressed and, most importantly, timekeeping.

Rochelle said: “He is behind his peers developmentally, he struggles getting dressed and his buttons will be done up wrong or he’ll come to me with his t-shirt on the wrong way round. One of the things also associated with that is that he cannot manage his time efficiently like others his age.

“In his previous school he was under a Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) – Eckington School is fully aware of that and of his condition.”

According to Rochelle, the secondary school has rules in place which mean that pupils cannot go to the toilet during the scheduled hour-long lessons and must go at either break or lunchtime.

However, after running out of time to use the loo during break and not wanting to be late back to lesson, Rochelle’s son decided he would ask his teacher when in class but was refused.

After staying in class a further ten minutes, and still being told no, he ended up wetting himself and had to be picked up from school in sodden clothes.

“It's a basic human right to be able to go to the toilet and there is no time limit on nature,” Rochelle added. “Eckington School should be ashamed of themselves, they have caused my son undue stress and embarrassment and he now says he doesn’t want to go to school. I’m just really upset and mad for him.

“If somebody else in the class would have seen him his life wouldn’t have been worth living, I know what kids can be like. It’s just not good enough, whether they have rules in place or not.

“They’ve now given him a toilet pass after I kicked off but it shouldn’t have gotten to that stage – it’s totally unacceptable.”

The LEAP Multi Academy Trust, which looks after Eckington School, said it is investigating the incident.