Bill Makes Breast Best; Law Will Save Mothers and Babies From Public Snubs

Summary

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No right-thinking person would agree to eat their lunch in a public toilet. It is unreasonable, not to mention unhygienic, to expect the smallest members of our society to do so. Yet there are still bars, restaurants and shopping centres in Scotland where breastfeeding mothers are being ordered to button up and excuse themselves. Alternatively, they could go into purdah until their babies are weaned, another unreasonable expectation in a society where women are nearly as active outside the home as men.

There is a third way. It is to engineer a cultural shift to make breastfeeding in public not only acceptable but normal. Public opinion is moving in the right direction, but official encouragement and voluntary codes will never alter the attitudes of the hard core of backward-thinking publicans, managers and customers who continue to dispense the milk of human unkindness on this issue. That is why the passing of Elaine Smith's Breastfeeding (Scotland) Bill is to be welcomed.

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Extract

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Bill Makes Breast Best; Law Will Save Mothers and Babies From Public Snubs

Breastfeeding could be called Scotland's second battle of the bottle. The situation is improving but, outwith Ir...

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