Breast ‘ban’ mum sues swimming pool for £20k after claiming staff broke law by stopping her feeding baby son

A MUM is suing a leisure centre for £20,000 after claiming staff stopped her breastfeeding her baby son in a swimming pool.

Concerned lifeguards saw Abbie Stocker feeding eight-month-old Eric in the water while waves created by a machine crashed around them.

Abbie, 27, was offered a poolside chair but refused, claiming she had been prevented from feeding her son.

Onlookers said she shouted at a manager before storming off to changing rooms. Weeks later bosses at Pendle Wavelengths in Nelson, Lancs, were hit with legal action.





Equality laws make it illegal to ask a breastfeeding woman to leave a public place.

Last night Abbie confirmed she was suing Wavelengths, saying: “The way they handled it was not positive.”

A source said: “A lifeguard saw a mum feeding her baby in the pool and thought she’d be more comfortable in a chair. The wave machine was on and can get pretty strong.

“The staff member thought the baby may become upset and was only trying to help.”

The source added: “Abbie then began saying it was against the law to stop a mum breastfeeding in public.

“That was never the case. The centre welcomes and supports breastfeeding mums.”

Signs backing breastfeeding are displayed throughout the complex.

One bemused member said: “It’s is ridiculous to think breastfeeding a child in a swimming pool is a sensible idea.

“If the baby had been sick, the pool would have had to be closed, drained and it would have been shut for days.

“It would have cost thousands and centre bosses have to consider the health and safety of other users, too.”




Pendle Leisure Trust, which runs the centre, confirmed they faced action.

Abbie, who still breastfeeds daughter Millie, three, received an apology from Burnley General Hospital two years after she was asked to leave a waiting area and breastfeed in another room.

She said at the time she “felt humiliated, like a naughty schoolgirl who had been made to wait outside the headteacher’s office.”

A spokesman for East Lancs Hospitals NHS Trust said it was “disappointing to hear that our offer of a room to allow Mrs Stocker privacy and comfort was misinterpreted on this occasion and we are sorry for any upset.”

Abbie said: “Breastfeeding women are no different to a disabled person or a person of a different nationality in the way you can’t discriminate against them.”