Hi Nina
I'm not sure if the site has starred out the relevant word or if you're being super cautious. ;-)

I think it's worth getting some more detail from the manager/employee about what the actual practical concerns are about school trips and seeing how you can mitigate those. I presume the employee is expressing while at work? If so are the concerns about having a private space/adequate storage facilities whilst out and about? You say you can't find them a private feeding area, but is that definitely the case? Or could you grant them some extra time before they leave school to express? I'm sure the barriers aren't surmountable with a little bit of creative thought and flexibility on both sides. ;-)

I went back to work (many years ago now) when my son was six months old and I was expressing at work. It didn't stop me going on business trips and to conferences, although I didn't go away overnight until my son was a bit older. I just made sure I had plenty of expressed milk in the freezer at home in case I wasn't able to express, expressed before I travelled and put the milk in the work fridge and on one occasion, arranged with a software supplier that I could borrow their conference room half an hour before our meeting started and put the milk in their fridge for the day. Thankfully it was a fairly short period of time as he dropped his day time milk feeds before he was a year old and just fed morning, tea time and night time from me. So this stage won't last forever, and in fact you're probably just talking a few months. There may not be that many trips in those months anyway so it may be actually quite a minor problem to resolve.

Hope that gives you some ideas about how to move forward.

Jackie

Is there any flexibility regarding who goes on the trips? The need to feed or express is usually for a relatively short period, so I wonder if another member of staff could swap with this colleague in the short term?

In reply to Jacqueline:

That was Nina... I guess in case email notifications get filtered out to our spam folders [?]

In reply to Steve Bridger:

It wasn't me, I was surprised that this part of the body was *** out - although I believe the correct terminology is "chest" feeding or "body feeding", although the later sounds really dreadful.

In reply to Jacqueline:

You are right I need to find out a bit more detail, I believe that they just don't want to do as asked, which is reasonable request. Thank you for your reply.

In reply to Nina:

I consider myself, err.. enlightened, but had to look up chestfeeding.

The 'system' must've removed the prefix "***". I'll see if it will allow me to add back in.

In reply to Nina:

Hi Nina

The "correct" term is whichever term the person doing the feeding prefers :)

Hope this helps

Emily

As someone who has (and still is) breastfeeding, a few hours (and you've said an afternoon or so, the vagueness of the timescale might also be putting her off) not being able to feed or pump, especially at the beginning, can cause mastitis which is unbearably painful and can lead to nasty infections and abscesses and it many cases requires antibiotics to clear (I have been there on several occasions, it is not fun).

This may sound like the employee is being awkward, but if she has an oversupply of milk like I do, then she needs to be feeding/pumping a lot. Not to mention, at the beginning the milk can leak out dramatically which is really embarrassing.

If you can't offer her the facilities she may need on the school trip for breastfeeding/pumping, then I'd say it's absolutely the employer being unreasonable and not her - for the reasons mentioned above. Take the scenario whereby you pressure her to do it, she becomes engorged, leaks everywhere, is made for of by students and then ends up in hospital with a mastitis related infection. Extreme I know, but not even vaguely outside the realms of reality (I had a situation where I missed one feed because my baby was sleeping, and I got terribly ill).

I don't think people appreciate how all consuming/challenging breastfeeding can be. The mother is obviously feeling very worried about it. The way you've worded your post implies you think she's being stubborn and trying to take time off, if it is 'refusal to work' then I'd say she's within her rights - you're potentially asking her to do something unsafe and I suggest you do some research about the health risks asking a new mother to delay pumping may cause.

In reply to Nina:

I think the correct word is *** feeding. Men's breasts might be referred to as a chest I guess but I think you could just refer to it as feeding if you wanted to be gender neutral. Seems much more inclusive.

On the other points I agree with Nina and Jacqueline. I'd go with a bit of a deeper discussion on what the needs are, the concerns and options or look at reasonable, short term alternatives to cover school trips. If, once you've exhausted the options and shown enhanced flexibility, you might then be able to reasonably suggest they are refusing.