A childminder has been ordered to take down a children's trampoline from her garden – for health and safety reasons.
Sharon Farmer has had the trampoline in her shared garden in Lewisham, south London, for 10 years. It has a safety net around the sides and it is supervised at all times when children are playing on it.
Not only that, but the parents of the children who use the trampoline have all given written permission for their children to use it, and Sharon is insured for the children she looks after. There have never been any accidents.
But health and safety officials from her housing association are still not happy, and have ordered her to remove it, claiming that children could be injured if they bounced off it onto the grass.
Sharon told the Daily Mail: 'When the children are on the trampoline, they are behaving themselves. It keeps them active and we know where they are.
'They are not allowed to play ball games on the green, so what else are they supposed to do?
'Maybe the housing association expect kids to just stand on it – they are a bunch of killjoys.'
A spokesman for L&Q, the housing association responsible for the decision, said it would check that the trampoline has been taken down by the time the children return to school next week. 'The trampoline will be reassessed next spring in conjunction with health and safety representatives to determine if there are any potential risks to residents from their use,' he told the Daily Mail.
Do you think trampolines are dangerous, or has the housing association over-reacted?