Boy, 8, left in class bogs for 3 hours as workers ignore him then deceive mother and father

The child ‘took himself’ to the toilet at lunchtime and remained there until the end of the school day without being brought water or food or checked on, a hearing was told

A primary school left a young boy stranded in a toilet cubicle for more than three hours, with no food or drink, a professional standards hearing has heard. According to evidence presented at the Education Workforce Council Wales fitness to practise committee, the boy was ignored and neglected after ‘secluding himself’.

Former headteacher of Waldo Williams Primary in Haverfordwest, Wales, Debbie Williams, recounted to the committee that teacher Sally Berry had failed to attend to the boy but informed his parents he had been monitored. Mrs Williams detailed how the child “took himself” to the toilet at 11.30am and remained there, door closed, until 3pm.

On April 7, as the virtual hearing got underway, Mrs Williams said: “The young person was in the bathroom with the door closed and no one going in. He was in the bathroom from 11.30am through to 3pm. He did not have access to water or food in that time.”

The former head, who was known as Mrs Bond at the time, also told the hearing that learning support staff were upset upon discovering Mrs Berry had misled the child’s parents about him being checked on while he was isolated in the toilet cubicle, reports Wales Online.

Mrs Williams reported to the tribunal: “One of them was really upset when the young person came out of the toilet and the feedback Mrs Berry gave to his parents. What Mrs Berry recounted to the parents was not what she (the support staff member) had witnessed through the day.”

Mrs Williams admitted that neither she nor other senior staff were in charge of the boy, and they were unaware of him being alone in the toilet until after the incident occurred. When questioned by the panel, she conceded that the staff involved did not appear to have followed health and safety procedures.

The accusations levelled at Ms Berry, dated 22 May 2023, suggest that she cooked up an antecedent, behaviour and consequence chart form about the incident involving Child A, which was riddled with errors about how often she had checked on him and/or the strategies employed.

She also faces a further allegation that on January 26 2023, when another child, Child X, made a comment threatening to harm a child, she did not inform a Designated Safeguarding Person (DSP) and/or the Headteacher; and/or b) The Child Care Assessment Team in a timely manner.

On the second day of the hearing on April 8, learning support assistant Michela Scott told the panel that she and fellow LSA Samantha Thomas had occasionally checked on Child A while he was holed up in the cubicle, but Mrs Berry hadn’t. Mrs Scott revealed that the boy wasn’t speaking or making eye contact and was communicating by flicking a tap on and off, but the door wasn’t locked.

Mrs Scott revealed: “Samantha Thomas and I checked on him during lunch. I checked on him twice during lunch and then loitered around the door,” she informed the committee. “Child A went to the toilet at approximately 11am and stayed there until his dad came to pick him up between 15.20 and 15.25.”

She further disclosed that senior staff were not informed about the incident until 2.25pm when Mrs Berry brought it to their attention. It was confirmed during the hearing that Child A had previously locked himself in the school toilet, using it as a “safe space” whenever he wanted to avoid something.

On the particular day, she assumed he had retreated to the toilet to dodge the school assembly. However, she expressed her surprise upon hearing Mrs Berry inform the boy’s parents that she had personally checked on him during his hours-long stay in the cubicle: “She definitely did not check on Child A every five to 10 minutes,” she told the panel.

The hearing is set to continue.