3-year-old strapped in car without water for 5 hours

A childminder has been struck off for leaving a
child of three strapped into a car for more than
five hours after forgetting she was there.
Carol Cort had given the youngster a lift to the
nursery she owned as a favour to her mum.
But when the 67-year-old arrived she picked
up her handbag, jumped out of the car and
locked the door, leaving the girl strapped in
her seat – with no food or drink.
She returned to the vehicle at 3pm but only
noticed the child still sitting there after she had
set off to pick up other children from an after-
school club.
The Care Standards Tribunal heard Mrs Cort
“found the child sitting exactly as she had
been when her mother strapped her in”.
Judge Meleri Tudur said: “Initially, she didn’t
realise what had happened, assuming the child
had been placed in the wrong vehicle by a
member of staff.
“Only when the child told her that she had
been forgotten did she realise that she had
been there all day."
The child, known as E, had been away from the
nursery the previous week, suffering from
chicken pox, so her absence went unnoticed.
Her mother had phoned the nursery at the end
of the day to ask after her - but thought a
member of staff was ‘joking’ when he said he
hadn’t seen her.
Cort, who had worked in child care for 46
years and was due to retire, immediately drove
to the youngster’s home in a “very distressed
state” and confessed all to her mum.
She told the mother: “I’ve done something
awful. I’ve ruined the nursery and let
everybody down.
“I’ve ruined it for the children”.
Cort, ravaged by guilt, offered E a free place at
the Barn Nursery School in Bourton-on-the-
Water.
But the mother later withdrew her daughter
from the Barn and reported the matter to the
local authority.
The nursery owner, who was on the verge of
retirement and handing over the business to
her daughter, was immediately suspended by
Ofsted.
Her lawyers told Judge Tudur she was under
severe strain due to concerns over her
mother’s care in a nursing home and
presented psychiatric evidence that she was
depressed at the time.
They pointed out that, since the incident, Mrs
Cort’s daughter had put in place a rigorous
regime of checking vehicles in the nursery’s
car park to ensure that no children had been
left inside.
What happened was a “one-off and inadvertent
absent-minded mistake”, described as “an
aberration” by her legal team.
However, Judge Tudur said the incident was
so grave that Mrs Cort’s registration as a
childminder had to be cancelled.
It was only by “good luck and chance” that E
had not come to serious harm.
Although she had made an immediate
confession to E’s mother after driving her
home, Mrs Cort had not told even her own
family about the incident - and more
importantly had not reported the incident to
Ofsted herself.
Mrs Cort had been given a number of glowing
references by other parents with children at
the nursery “expressing their satisfaction” with
her work and praising her contribution to the
community.
But Judge Tudur said the nursery “was not
expecting E to attend” and expressed “serious
concerns” about the ad hoc arrangement for
giving E a lift to the Barn and the absence of
her name from the register that day.
She added: “A professional offering child care
for up to 100 children at any one time should
be able to say with certainty which children
will be attending on any particular day.
“The sequence of events leading to E being left
in the vehicle simply highlighted the risks
presented from lax conduct around children’s
attendance which placed children at
unnecessary risk of harm or neglect."
Despite Mrs Cort’s long and unblemished
history as a child carer, Judge Tudur
concluded: “The incident and the surrounding
issues identified are sufficient to merit the
cancellation of Mrs Cort’s registration."