Moms and babies plan to stage a protest "nurse-in" at the Centre on Barton on Saturday after a Hamilton mother said she was asked to cover up while breastfeeding.

Monika Skarratt said she was eating in the food court Thursday night with her family when her one-year-old daughter, Calista, became hungry. She started to breastfeed the girl and a security guard approached her.

"I started feeding her and the security guard came up and said, 'Do you have a blanket?'"

Skarratt said she was surprised because she is a regular at the mall and has breastfed her daughter there often.

She said she explained it was a mother's right to breastfeed her baby in public. The security guard said the mall was private property.

"At this point, I was getting very angry, so I said I will take my business elsewhere," she said. "I just got up and walked away with the baby still feeding."

Skarratt said she was livid after the incident and reported the encounter on a Meeting Other Moms Facebook page. That brought a quick response from Hamilton-area members in the group and breastfeeding advocates across the city.

They have scheduled a "nurse-in" at the mall Saturday at 10 a.m.

Wayne Roberts, general manager of the Centre on Barton, said it's mall policy that all breastfeeding mothers are welcome. He said the security guard in question was a younger, less experienced employee of a security firm and not a mall worker.

Roberts said the employee will have the policy clarified for him so the same mistake won't be repeated.

"It's certainly not our policy," said Roberts. "You're talking to a father of two breast-fed kids and five breast-fed grandchildren."

Roberts said it was the first time he was aware of any incident of its type at the mall and he will apologize to Skarratt.

Becca Charron, co-chair of the group Halton Baby Friendly Initiative, said she hopes the "nurse-in" will be a reminder to everyone of a woman's right to feed her baby.

"Right now, there are about 60 of us who will be showing up at the food court," she said.

"We will all be feeding our babies."

"No one should prevent you from breastfeeding your child simply because you are in a public area.

"They should not ask you to cover up, disturb you, or ask you to move to another area that is more discreet."

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Charron said cases such as this are no longer common, but it's hard to estimate how often women are told not to breastfeed in public places.

"Some women don't have the courage to talk about it."

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