The least any child and parent should expect from a nursery trip is that none of the children are forgotten on said outing.
Shockingly, that was not the case for four-year-old Carson Hodge and his mum Clare after the youngster was abandoned at the Scottish Deer Centre last week.
Carson was found crying by another visitor after his group from Dunmore Nursery in Lochgelly left without him while he was in the toilet.
Staff at the attraction were left caring for the four-year-old for 40 minutes before someone from the nursery returned to get him.
That is a failure of the utmost magnitude and everyone involved is lucky the incident ended the way it did – because the outcome could have been very different.
Child was found by a stranger
Carson’s mum Clare is rightly furious, what parent wouldn’t be?
Her young child was found by a complete stranger in a vulnerable state.
Thankfully, that stranger was an upstanding citizen and not the type of person who, unfortunately, often appears in our courts and the pages of this newspaper.
But it is of grave concern that a four-year-old was put in such a potentially dangerous situation.
Fife Council, which runs the nursery, has apologised “wholeheartedly” and promised to investigate.
It is imperative that the results and learnings of those investigations are explained to the public.
If they are not, then how can any parent trust that their child is safe in the hands of a Fife Council nursery?
Two forgotten children in under 10 years
Because this is not the first time a nursery from the local authority has lost a child.
In 2015, a five-year-old boy from Dunfermline was left at Blair Drummond Safari Park, before eventually being found by police.
How can one council lose two children in the space of ten years?
In both cases, the nursery bus left the attraction without the child on board.
In both cases, the council said it would investigate.
Worryingly, Clare claims she was “asked on several occasions” not to share what happened to her child on social media.
Incidents like this should not be swept under the proverbial carpet so the council can save face while potential risks to child safety go unchallenged.
No proof that lessons have been learned
And what were the learnings from the 2015 case? Because they most certainly haven’t been followed here.
Or if they have, that is even more concerning.
Fife Council says there are “robust guidance and procedures” in place for nurseries taking children on an outing.
According to Clare, there were only nine children in total on the trip.
Surely any “robust” measure involving child safety would include the ability to count to nine.
Questions must also be asked around why a four-year-old child was allowed to use the toilet facilities by himself while the rest of his group got on a bus.
If “robust” safety measures were being followed, would a guardian not have accompanied the youngster to the loo?
The local authority must provide answers to all of these questions and decisive action will need to be taken when their investigation concludes.
Following two incidents of striking similarity, they must prove they can be entrusted to look after children in their care.
Conversation