FOR 15 years the children of Wychwood Primary have entertained themselves with crates given to them by the local milkman.

Countless numbers of imaginery cars, ships and dens have been made out of the 25 crates.

But now the stunned children have discovered they have been seized back by Dairy Crest – because of health and safety fears.

Stunned foundation stage leader Anne Bardsley said: “In all the time we have had the crates, we have not had a single child hurt themselves.

“They have got no right to make judgements of health and safety on my risk management. It is absolutely outrageous.”

Pupils were always supervised and crates helped creative learning, she said.

She said: “The children absolutely loved them. They used to make castles, ships and cars out of them, and would put blankets over them to make dens.

“They kept asking where they had gone and I had to say the milkman has got in a muddle and taken them away.

“They were quite upset about it, but I am absolutely spitting.”

It is believed the crates were originally left by previous dairy owenrs, rather than Dairy Crest.

The crates were taken during a delivery without telling the school.

Dairy Crest spokesman Lyndsey Anderson said: “We are sorry to have caused any distress to the children and staff at Wychwood CE Primary School by removing the old milk crates.

“We have contacted the school and hope to make it up to them by helping to provide alternative equipment.”

Yet she said: “Whilst we understand their disappointment at losing something they had come to view as playground equipment, it remains a fact that milk crates are not toys and current health and safety guidelines require that they should not be used as such.

“It is not Dairy Crest’s policy to provide crates for anything other than their sole purpose – which is to transport milk bottles.

“It appears that this was not made clear to staff at the school and we can only apologise for any breakdown in communication when the crates were retrieved.”

Ms Anderson added: “There are lots of ways in which they could be misused and they could break, and it is very sharp plastic if they do.”