25 May 2000
A SEVEN-MONTH-OLD baby and his mother were thrown off a bus because he was crying, the mother has claimed.
Christopher Buckingham and mum Amanda were trying to travel from Cambridge to their home 18 miles away in Huntingdon.
Amanda had had to take Christopher out of his pushchair as there was very little room
on the bus, which woke him up and started him crying.
She claimed that the driver said: “Can’t you shut him up” and “I
can’t take this anymore” before stopping, opening the doors and ordering the
pair off, along with a friend and her two young children.
The five were left six miles from home, in a village they did not know well, Amanda
told the Daily Mail.
Amanda said she had to call her husband to come and collect her and he had to drive
around to find them.
She told the Mail: “If a screaming child is all it takes to disrupt his
concentration then he isn’t safe to drive the public. He didn’t know anything
about our circumstances, whether we had any money on us or a mobile phone – or even
if we had anyone who could come and get us.”
The bus company has launched an investigation, but has refused to comment on the
incident. A spokesman said it was not company policy to ask young mothers and babies to
get off before reaching their destination.
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