A Musim mum has pulled her children out of school after she says they were given pork sausages for school lunch. Mussrat Bibi says not only did it go against their religious beliefs but it left her children sick.
She claims this then spread throughout her whole family giving them all a stomach bug. Now she is calling on Hollyfield Primary School in Sutton Coldfield to "mend its ways" to avoid other families facing the same issue, reports Birmingham Live.
The 41-year-old said the situation was "really upsetting" and even claimed it put one of her children in hospital. She said: "I couldn't see my children the way they were really ill.
"They have never had issues with food I've been making at home. It passed around. The hospital said it passed around in the family. It turned into a bug and that bug has spread all around the family."
A school spokesman has apologised "if any mistakes were made". It said action was being taken to cut the risk to it happening again.
According to NHS guidance, all products from pork, carrion and blood are haram - or forbidden - in Islam. The guidance says that in Britain Muslims buy their meat from a Muslim butcher whenever possible.
Muslims also do not eat generally available meat or food that contains animal fats. This is in case it contains pork fat or fat from other animals not ritually slaughtered.
But angry Ms Bibi, who has eight children between the ages of two and 19, expressed dismay that brothers Rayhaan and Sufiyaan were given pork sausages at their school. Asked if she felt let down by the school, Ms Bibi said she did.
She urged bosses to make the guidance clearer and ensure the same doesn't happen to other families. And she said the school needed to "do a better job" for other Muslim children at the school.
She added: "They need to fix up. They need to mend their ways. They need to write it on the system [if] they don't do any halal food. They should have told me in the first place."
"I'll no longer be taking the kids there to that school after what's happened," she added. "My children come first."
A spokesperson for Hollyfield Primary School said: “We are sorry if any mistakes were made in this instance. We have a system in place for children with dietary requirements who have school lunches, issuing badges for the children so staff can clearly see what those requirements are. We will of course review our system to ensure it is even more robust to reduce further the risk of this sort of thing happening again.”
For more stories from where you live, visit InYourArea
