This week, a Blaenau Gwent County Borough Council school policy requiring parents to personally change children’s nappies at school hit the news cycles. As a potty training expert, and children’s nurse, Rebecca Mottram wants to make it clear that this is a backwards step and offer a more child-centred solution.
The new policy stipulates that teachers will no longer assist with changing nappies or pull-ups unless the child has a “medically recognised need.” According to the Blaenau Gwent County Council, “It is the responsibility of parents and carers to ensure their child is toilet trained. However, due to feedback from schools reporting a significant number of pupils arriving in nappies, we have implemented this policy.” None of the other 21 local authorities in Wales have a similar policy but if widely adopted, it will cause harm to many more children.
As parents, we all want to know that our children are safe, cared for, and treated with dignity at school. This new policy threatens to leave some of our most vulnerable children at risk of harm, neglect, and stigma.
The decision to make parents responsible for coming into school to change their child’s nappy ignores the realities of potty training struggles and places children in an untenable position. Imagine your child sitting in discomfort, waiting for you to arrive—embarrassed, in pain, and excluded from their peers. It’s a heartbreaking scenario that no parent should have to endure, and no child should have to experience.
Why does this policy put children at risk?
Adopting a policy to mandate that parents must come to school to change their children’s nappies puts children’s rights at risk in many ways. It poses significant risks to the well-being, dignity, and rights of children.
The risks of such an approach are significant. Children may experience increased stress and pressure to toilet train prematurely, leading to issues like withholding or chronic constipation. This, in turn, can cause long-term bladder and bowel damage. Beyond the immediate distress for families, these outcomes could result in greater demand on the NHS to address avoidable health complication
Policies that rigidly expect all children to be out of nappies by school age contradict our growing understanding that children develop at different rates. Instead of supporting families, these policies push the burden onto parents in an unhelpful way, causing distress and putting undue pressure on children.
The new policy contravenes several legal frameworks, international conventions, and principles that guide child welfare, human rights, and anti-discrimination policies, including:
Right to Dignity: Leaving a child in a soiled nappy while waiting for a parent to arrive can cause severe emotional distress, embarrassment, and humiliation. This is a direct violation of Article 16 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), which guarantees every child the right to protection of their dignity and privacy.
Right to Health: Prolonged exposure to a soiled nappy can lead to discomfort, rashes, and infections, violating Article 24 of the UNCRC, which ensures the right to the highest attainable standard of health.
Protection from Discrimination: Children who struggle with potty training due to developmental delays, disabilities, or medical conditions risk being stigmatised and excluded, contrary to the Equality Act 2010. This policy disproportionately impacts children with additional needs, creating barriers to their full participation in education.
Safeguarding Duties: Schools have a legal duty under the Children Act 1989 to safeguard and promote the welfare of all children. Delegating basic care responsibilities to parents during school hours undermines this duty and risks neglecting the child’s immediate needs.
The request for parents to come to school to change their child’s nappies shifts responsibility from the education system onto families, rather than addressing the systemic issues at play. This approach reflects a misunderstanding of potty training challenges and mirrors the broader problems faced by individuals with disabilities. Instead of using a social model, where the environment is adapted to meet the needs of the child, schools are expecting children to adapt to environments that may not suit their unique developmental timelines or needs.
Why Do some children Use Nappies When they start school?
Potty training is a skill that requires guidance, patience, and a gentle, child-centred approach.
In 2024, Over 1.6 million pupils in England were reported to have special educational needs (SEN) and this figure increased by 101,000 from 2023. This includes the number of pupils with an education, health and care (EHC) plan and the number of pupils with SEN support but does not include the number of children suspected of having SEN needs who have not been formerly diagnosed or are waiting for support with an EHC plan or SEN support.
At least 1 third of children in the UK are currently constipated, and may or may not have this as a ‘diagnosed medication condition’.
Not being fully potty trained by the time a child starts school can be classed as a disability and children with disabilities require policies which take their needs into consideration.
Parents and educators alike need trusted, research-backed advice to navigate the challenges of potty training, particularly for children who may face unique hurdles.
Why saying Parents are “lazy” is a Pile of crap
It’s been encouraging to see growing support for children who need individualised care (often described as “neurodivergent,” though I prefer not to use the term as it implies a fixed idea of what is “normal”). However, it’s deeply disheartening to hear claims that parents are “lazy” when their children with unique needs start school suffering from bowel or bladder accidents or using nappies or pull-ups.
In over a decade of supporting parents with potty training, I’ve spoken to hundreds of thousands of families, and not once would I describe a parent as lazy or shirking responsibility. On the contrary, every parent whose child is using nappies at school has been deeply distressed and desperate to help their child move forward.
These parents consistently share stories of being unsupported, with their child’s needs—obvious to any medical or educational professional—going unrecognised. I’m talking about children with toileting anxiety, undiagnosed difficulties with adapting to change or processing sensory information, unrecognised and untreated or poorly managed constipation (which looks very different in children than in adults), and those who have experienced trauma around toileting, abuse, or have been given harmful advice.
All children are vulnerable simply because they are children, and it is our responsibility as adults to understand their needs and provide the right support. Saying a policy is acceptable because it excludes those with “medical needs” completely misses the point. The vast majority of children starting school in nappies have unrecognised needs. By focusing only on “medical needs,” we are failing these children and their families in an unforgivable way.
Modern parents are set up to fail as you may remember from my blog Potty Training Problems – it’s not your fault. We live a busy, stressful, over-stimulating life which is not designed to meet the needs of parents. Parents are treated like a commodity and rather than generations of sound advice about child development being passed down through communities and families, parents are now isolated, unsupported and constantly exposed to misinformation and bad guidance perpetuated by companies who want to profit from them.
What role do disposable nappies play?
A big one. Over the last 70 years, our culture has shifted away from hundreds of years of using a cloth nappy as a backup whilst teaching potty skills from birth (and thousands of years of no nappy at all before that) to wrapping our children in a plastic nappy filled with materials which are designed to instantly absorb their wee. As a result. children do not get the biofeedback that tells them something is happening in their body. They are completely disconnected from it and as such are prevented from learning.
Many parents don’t even question that there is any alternative – disposable nappies are just what we use and the marketing messaging parents receive is “use these until your child is ready to stop” – but as you may now be realising, readiness is a myth! It is a myth designed by a nappy manufacturer to delay parents teaching potty skills so they will keep buying nappies for longer. The myth endures because an industry sprung up around resolving the problem – from pull up pants to nappy watches and even smart nappies connected to apps.
And it’s incredibly effective. Children are now so far from “ready” that they are are starting school without the skills they need to listen to their bodies and take action or with behavioural and emotional barriers to making the transiton. Prolongued nappy usage is not only bad for the development of good bladder and bowel health, but if children struggle with potty training to the point where they withold their wee or poo, this leads to health issues like UTIs and constipation.
What needs to change?
We should be fostering understanding, compassion, and practical solutions to support children’s development. The assumption that starting school is an appropriate cut-off point for being out of nappies is both arbitrary and unrealistic for many children. This blanket expectation disregards the fact that not all children transition from nappies at the same age or in the same way.
If we truly want to support children and families, schools and policymakers need to prioritise creating environments that accommodate children’s developmental diversity and provide resources to help parents navigate potty training in a way that suits their child.
We also need to help parents to understand how to effectively use disposable nappies and how to potty train, to prevent the disadvantages that long-term disposable nappy use can have. This means we need to invest in better alternative solutions to manage our babies wee and pool and start potty training earlier. Earlier potty training is scientifically proven to be best for bowel and bladder health and can help prevent the vast majority of children starting school in nappies.
At the same time, the advice we give to parents on potty training also needs to move away from promoting a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, we need to support parents to individualise the process based on their child’s specific needs.
Without these changes, we risk failing the very children we aim to support now and for their future well-being and health.
What am I doing about it?
I make it my mission as a clinician to offer sound, evidence-based guidance for free to parents, carers and childcare workers to ensure that their children get the start in life that they need to one day become toilet independent.
What can you do about it?
If your child is struggling with this issue and you need help, you may find it helpful to read my free resource which explains your child’s rights and how to effectively work with your child’s school to address toileting issues. You can request your free download using the form below.
Nurse Rebecca Mottram is an advocate for Baby Pottying and a potty training expert. She is the author of two books; The Baby Pottying Guide and Positively Potty, the host of the Go Potty Podcast and founder of the Little Bunny Bear shop. If you are trying to resolve a potty problem, you can explore Rebecca’s free resources, join her Facebook group or request a private consultation.
One response to “Starting school with your child in nappies”
I do think a better approach is needed by the NHS and those supporting parents re potty training and the waiting for readiness approach myth being truly ended. And I agree its not the childs fault if they haven’t been potty training before school so to leave them in their poo is cruel. Unfortunately though, I have met many parents who cant be bothered to train currently nappies dont’ bother them and they’d rather not, or expect the nursery to do it etc etc. So I though I am sure many parents are ill informed about the realities of potty training and theres the lies of marketing at play + kids who have some other undiagnosed special needs. There are lazy parents out there, unfortunately. Obviously there are some people also neglecting their children as well. However overall I agree telling parents to come in doesn’t really help and likely wont make a difference.