Echo to the rescue of Hedge End mum (From Daily Echo)

Echo to the rescue of Hedge End mum

10:18am Saturday 21st November 2009

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A SINGLE mum and her young children were refused a free photoshoot – because their family was missing a dad.

Lucinda Buckett won a competition for a family photography session with the firm Foto Trendz at her Hedge End home.

But the 24-year-old, who has been separated for six months, was left stunned and feeling humiliated after the giveaway was cancelled – because a second adult was not present.

She claims she was told she had not followed the rules of the competition and that she would have to pay to do the same with one less person.

Lucinda, of Havendale in Hedge End, said: “It made me feel really inadequate and that we are not a real family.

“I thought it would be nice for the children to have a picture of us in our new house to cement our family.

“The photographer said the competition prize was a family portrait and said it was only for two adults and two children so we didn’t qualify.

“I kept thinking how horrible it was for someone to come to my home and treat me like that.

“I just don’t want other people to have to go through the same experience.”

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ECHO TO THE RESCUE

After hearing of Lucinda Buckett’s experience, the Daily Echo offered to step in and take the family portrait.
Lucinda and her children Piper, 3, and Hayden, two-and-a-half, came along to the Daily Echo studio at the newspaper’s Redbridge offices to sit for picture editor Paul Collins (see the result above).
Editor Ian Murray said: “We were only too pleased to help the family out after Foto Trendz refused to take a family portrait. “We hope Lucinda is happy with the result – it’s a lovely picture.”

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The company says Mrs Buckett filled out her competition form incorrectly, stating that she would be accompanied by another adult.

But Lucinda has disputed that version of events, adding: “At first I wasn’t sure whether there were going to be one or two adults present and so they just told me to put down two.

“When I spoke to the company on the phone later, they said it didn’t matter if it was one adult.

“It really upset me and I consider myself a strong person.

“The children were really looking forward to it.”

But Foto Trendz owner Mark Vella said Lucinda had entered the competition “under false pretences”.

“The rules of the competition say it has to be a family of two adults plus two children,” he told the Daily Echo.

“Our rules are rules and we stick to our rules. They are not negotiable.

“You get in the car and go along expecting to photograph a family and half the family is not there.

“She would not have been called at the outset if she had told me that she was not a full family.”

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