Nursery World - Our nursery is on the losing side of the law

Unlike Little Angels Day Nursery and Pre-school in Sandwell (News, 12 April), we recently lost a long and protracted court case in which we were sued by our neighbour.

The council were even called in by the neighbour to test noise levels. They found the children's noise to be inside EU guidelines on noise nuisance.

We have consistently good Ofsted reports and have a good reputation locally. There is a maximum of 15 children outside for 20 minutes, twice in the morning and twice in the after noon (two age groups) and there is no sound at our property after 6pm weekdays or at weekends.

Finally, the neighbour took out a court action in 2003 claiming noise nuisance and demanding compensation. At the three-day hearing we felt that the judge believed everything she said and nothing we said. We ended up paying the neighbour £7,500 damages, her tenant £500 damages, double-glazed her house and put up a 30m-long fence on top of the brick wall that divides 's. We also had to pay all the solicitor, barrister and court costs, currently £85,000 (the final costs are being worked out) and we were only covered up to £50,000.

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