”I feel like my right as a parent has been taken away from me,” Maureen Smith, the girl’s mother, explained. ”I feel like I’ve had my heart ripped out so God knows what my daughter is going through. When she had her appendix out I signed two forms but nobody thought to tell me about this.” So, should the Brunts School in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, have usurped parental responsibility and proceeded without consulting the mother?