Toddlers are notoriously difficult to look after. Once they become mobile, those caring for them cannot take their eyes off them for more than a second or two in case they get themselves into mischief.

So it is understandable that Baildon mother Kathryn Burnet is upset and angry that her son Callum, at the age of two-and-a-half, was able to let himself out of the nursery where she had left him and end up in a garden across the road.

According to the nursery, he had been missing for only a couple of minutes before he was found. But every parents will surely empathise with the "What if...?" feeling of panic experienced by Mrs Burnet when she contemplates the possibilities.

Fortunately Callum survived the experience unharmed. He wasn't knocked over by a car as he crossed the road. He wasn't abused by an opportunist child molester. It is to protect their children from such real or imagined perils that people place them in the care of professionals. In this particular case, there appears to have been a lapse in that care.

Mrs Burnet admits that Callum is "hyperactive" and "hard to handle" and the nursery has now said that because of his behaviour it wants his mother to remove him from its care. Yet surely if he is so troublesome the problem should have come to a head sooner.

It is reassuring that the nursery concerned says it has now reviewed its security system. Even so, Bradford Council should go ahead with its inquiry. Its findings might offer guidance to other nurseries on how to eliminate all risk of further incidents of this sort.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.