A mother from Nottinghamshire has removed her son from his primary school due to "no empathy or sympathy" after being fined for keeping him away with coronavirus symptoms.
Annette Connelly, of Eastwood, told Nottinghamshire Live that she kept eight-year-old son Harrison at home on Thursday November 3 after she caught Covid-19 and he started to develop symptoms.
Ms Connelly, 44, claimed Harrison felt sick and weak, and had a cough but received a negative PCR test result.
Despite the negative result, she kept her son away from Lawrence View Primary School for another day, saying he developed further symptoms - specifically a lack of taste and smell.
She then received a call from the school asking Harrison to attend and, when she refused, she was told she would be fined.
"I didn't know if he had got it but he might have had, I was keeping him away from others and trying to protect them," the mother-of-four said.
"Things have been hard enough for me this year and things are tight. They have no empathy or sympathy when all I've tried to do is be a mum."
Lawrence View said fines were only issued as a "last resort after many attempts to address low attendance with a family".
"They had no sympathetic views," Ms Connelly added. "He will not be coming back to the school after this.
"It's a shame as we had a good relationship with the school. Harrison has a good circle of friends that he will really miss. It's sad that it's had to end this way."
Lawrence View headteacher Emma McGrenaghan said: "Our school continues to follow the latest government guidance in relation to Covid and I’d like to reassure parents that we continue to have additional protective measures in place in school to keep pupils and staff safe.
"If a child is well enough, and has received a negative PCR test result, they can return to school. We would not knowingly put our families in school at risk.
“The school is committed to providing a high quality education for our pupils and where there are barriers to regular attendance we will always try to work with families."
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