A restaurant has told parents to leave their kids at home - they're not welcome.
The Little Bistro restaurant, in Akaroa, doesn't permit children under 10 to eat on the premises.
Owner Richard Uttley said the move to go child-free came after several complaints from diners and an incident where a child ran into an employee, injuring her.
"A child ran into a waitress with a tray of glasses and she cut her arm pretty severely," Uttley said.
"As an employer we are responsible for minimising health and safety risks to our employees."
Uttley said the size of the Banks Peninsula restaurant was another factor that led to the policy.
"Tables are intimately tight so there is no room for children to play, run around or be off their seats even."
He said their original intention was to set the age at 12.
"But after consulting several parents who dine at the bistro, school teachers and looking into the stages of psychosocial behaviour, we felt that the age was too high and reduced it to 10," Uttley said.
A woman, who doesn't wish to be named, took her 8-year-old granddaughter to the restaurant last weekend only to be turned away by Uttley.
She said her main gripe was that the policy wasn't well advertised and if she'd known, she would not have taken the child.
Uttley insisted it was online and said it was also written in chalk outside the restaurant.
From a legal standpoint, Waldren said there are two pieces of legislation that come into play with Uttely's policy – the Sale & Supply of Alcohol Act, the Human Rights Act and the Health & Safety at Work Act
"You can't discriminate by age, however this applies to people over the age of 16 years. So, if their policy was for children, this is lawful," she said.
A Human Rights Commission spokesperson said the Commission sometimes received complaints about children in restaurants.
But under the Human Rights Act, it was "not unlawful to treat people under the age of 16 differently on the basis of age".
Anyone who feels like they may have been discriminated against can contact the Commission's enquiry and complaints team.作者: lychee 时间: 2018-5-7 10:26:02