Mum slams shop for forcing her to change her disabled children on a bathroom floor

A leading British department store has been criticized after an image of a mother of a disabled girl changing her daughter's clothes on the store's bathroom floor appeared online.

The mother's friend, Laura Moore shared a photo on Twitter of the young girl on the floor of a toilet cubicle in a John Lewis store at Horsham on her behalf.

She lambasted the department store for not providing the correct changing room for disabled kids and suggested their annual iconic Christmas advert, believed to have cost $12 million, took attention away from their failures in store.

Ms Moore's tweet read: "While everyone is swooning over how wonderful the new @johnlewisretail advert is... just take a moment to look at this photo which was taken in one of their stores because they don't provide #changingplaces for severely disabled people & refuse to do so. Priorities."

The post on Friday has since been retweeted over one thousand times while the mother was indundated with a string of messages from parents calling for the appropriate facilities to be provided for disabled children.

"I’m sorry but that’s atrocious!! To actually be in a similar situations to the thousands upon thousands of people who require one & still NOT care!," one Twitter user wrote.

"Absolutely shocking, £7m on advertising campaign and a human being is degraded to lying on a bathroom floor," another said.

Ms Moore, who has a disabled son herself, is an advocate of Changing Places, a campaign calling on retailers to include suitable areas for parents to change their disabled children, The Manchester Evening News reported.

Disabled children's changing facilities differ from baby changing rooms on offer in most public places with larger adjustable benches and a mechanical hoist to move the child from their wheelchair.

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A John Lewis spokesperson said they are looking into the matter.

"We have disabled customer toilets and parent and child facilities in our shops, unfortunately due to the limited space we are unable to make the changes that Changing Places desire at this point in time in existing shops," they said.

"However, we are reviewing the feasibility of putting hoists and changing benches in new department stores and including this in store refurbishment plans."