A young mother was kicked out of a Jobcentre for trying to feed her baby.

Samantha Corbridge, 24, of Hardwick Road, Hove, took her two-year old daughter Robyn with her to Jobcentre Plus in Boundary Road, Hove, to pick up forms and to use the centre’s computers to help her get back to work.

But while she was there Robyn needed feeding and when Miss Corbridge took out the milk bottle she was asked to leave.

She told The Argus yesterday: “Robyn started crying, I was rocking her pram to try and calm her down.

“The staff told me I must keep her quiet because she was disrupting the other people and we were in a place of work.

“I apologised and said I thought she was hungry.

“I looked through my baby bag to get a bottle I had prepared for her and suddenly a member of staff rushed over and said: ‘You can’t give her that. It’s classed as food and drink so if you want to give it to her you’ll have to leave the premises’.

“As I took the milk off my daughter she started to scream, which made it even more difficult for me to take her outside. I felt humiliated.”

Miss Corbridge had to feed her young child on the steps outside after the incident, which happened on Wednesday last week.

She said: “It was freezing and Robyn got very cold.

“I needed to go back in to make another call but I decided not to because I didn’t feel welcome.”

In June last year, mothers were given the legal right to breastfeed babies in public, in shops and cafés and on public transport.

Brighton and Hove City Council employee Lindsey Singleton saw the incident and said: “I was absolutely appalled. I have made a formal complaint about this member of staff’s treatment of this young mother.

“The rules and regulations about drinking for adults should not apply to babies and in my experience never have.

“The member of staff was very rude and humiliated this young woman. I have raised the issue with the council.”

A Jobcentre Plus spokesman said: “Jobcentre Plus asks our customers to attend on an individual basis in order to give an individual and personal service.

“We ask all customers to attend on their own unless they need assistance. There appears to have been an unfortunate misunderstanding in this instance.

“We will, as a matter of course, speak to the office involved in this case.