Our little boy choked to death at nursery – we want one big change | UK | News

During his short time on earth, Oliver Steeper was a happy baby. One of his greatest pleasures in life was something most of us barely notice – watching trees blowing in the wind. There are numerous photos of him with his shock of unruly hair gazing upwards at branches or dissolving into adorable giggles at dancing leaves.

For his parents, Lewis and Zoe Steeper, the images – both real and imprinted in their heads – are the precious memories they cling to of their first born son who tragically choked on food at a nursery aged nine months and died six days later. “He was such a little bundle of joy straight from the bat,” says Lewis. “He was his own little character. He was a cracking little lad.”

One of the couple’s most treasured photographs with Oli, as they call him, was taken during a family trip to a rare breeds centre. “It’s like a forest little trail and he’s just looking up, laughing away,” says Lewis. “That’s one of the best memories we’ve got. That picture.”

Oli suffered a catastrophic choking incident on September 23, 2021, while being cared for at Jelly Beans Nursery in Ashford, Kent. His parents Lewis, 41, and Zoe, 36, have spent the years since fighting for answers over the circumstances surrounding their son’s death.

Now, after enduring an inquest, a police investigation and a civil case, Lewis and Zoe have channelled their grief into an extraordinary legacy. Through the Oliver Steeper Foundation, the charity they have set up in Oli’s memory, the couple provide anti-choking devices to childcare settings – and this month reached the staggering milestone of giving away their 2,000th kit. Next, they hope to expand their work into schools – more of which later.

I am speaking to Lewis and Zoe over Zoom while they sit in Oli’s empty nursery that has since become the unofficial headquarters of their charity. Photos and murals adorn the walls – reminders of their cherished son and the reason why the heartbroken couple are determined fight for better safety measures in childcare settings.

It is a remarkable legacy for a little boy who arrived at an extraordinary moment in history. Oli was born in 2020, during the Covid pandemic.

The couple, who married in 2019, had wanted a baby and were delighted when Zoe became pregnant quickly. “He was very much wanted,” she beams. Yet becoming first-time parents during lockdown meant their experience was very different from the one they had imagined.

But despite the difficult circumstances surrounding his arrival, Oli instantly transformed their lives. Lockdown also gave the new family something precious: time together. “Because it was during Covid, we probably spent more meaningful time with him,” says Lewis. “We were forced to. We were walking around with Oli, going on socially distanced walks.”

Their son was generally a contented baby, although sleep was another matter. “He was a bit of an owl,” Zoe laughs. “He didn’t cry during the day unless he was hungry or tired. He wasn’t a whingey baby. “But it was hard at times, especially with the no sleep.”

As their baby grew, Lewis, a surveyor, and Zoe a fire safety inspector, began having all the conversations familiar to new parents. What would his voice sound like? When would he walk? “You start thinking about schools,” Lewis says. “You wonder what he’s going to sound like or when he’s going to start talking or when he’s going to start walking.”

Then came what seemed the next logical step for two parents juggling work with a busy family life: nursery. Like millions of parents, they believed that a regulated childcare setting would have the appropriate procedures and trained staff in place. And when Oli started attending Jelly Beans two days a week, initially with shorter settling-in sessions, they initially felt reassured by its staff and facilities.

“We thought we’d struck gold,” says Lewis. “We walked out of there and said, ‘We’re not even going to consider the other ones we’ve been to’. We thought we couldn’t pass up the opportunity for him to be in the care of someone so experienced.”

With the benefit of hindsight, however, Zoe remembers moments she now wishes she had questioned. On one early visit, staff assumed Oli was old enough to walk around the nursery his own, something Zoe admits now should have been a “red flag” in her head.

Still, as a first-time mother, she assumed the professionals knew best. “I very much didn’t want to rock the boat,” she says. Lewis nods in agreement. “They’re regulated. You assume they should be up to scratch.”

Sadly, agonisingly, the couple would realise that this was not the case concerning their son. On September 23, the day that Oli choked on his food, Zoe dropped him at the nursery at 7.50am. She was running slightly late and remembers worrying about what the staff might think.

Around two hours later, the phone rang. Zoe was told Oli had suffered a choking incident and was with paramedics. Crucially, she remembers being reassured that he was “ok.” “In my head I was thinking, ‘Don’t panic, Zoe’,” she says. “They said he’s ok. He’s with the paramedics. I was thinking, ‘Be calm for him. He can’t see that I’m upset or scared’.”

But nothing could have prepared her for the scene greeting her at the nursery. Oli was being given emergency treatment and Zoe was hurried into the ambulance. “I abandoned my car. I remember asking what was happening.”

Lewis was based more than two hours away when his phone rang. “I couldn’t understand a word Zoe was saying,” he recalls. “She was screaming in panic and all I got was ‘CPR’ and ‘Oli’, and then it went dead.” He immediately raced to William Harvey Hospital in Ashford where Oli was being treated.

Lewis remembers fighting his way through a crowd of medical staff to reach his son. “It was so weird because there was just a sea of people around him,” he says. “When I finally got to see him, his head with his crazy hair still looked like Oli. I couldn’t process it.”

Doctors decided Oli needed specialist treatment in London and he was transferred to Evelina London Children’s Hospital. There, Lewis and Zoe were confronted with devastating news. One doctor warned them they needed to prepare themselves for the possibility that their son would not survive. Lewis initially reacted with anger. “I said, ‘How can you tell that? He’s only been here 15 minutes’,” he remembers.

Later, however, he came to appreciate the doctor’s candour. “It was the best thing she could have done for us,” he says. “She was managing our expectations. We were clinging on to hope.”

The couple remained at Oli’s bedside for a week. They played him the theme tune to Hey Duggee, one of his favourites, and made casts of his tiny hands and feet. However, they were told Oli had suffered a cardiac arrest and “unrecoverable neurological damage”.

Amid unimaginable grief, Lewis and Zoe then made a decision that would reveal something of the philosophy which has driven them ever since. When hospital staff approached them about organ donation, their answer was immediate. “We just looked at each other, looked back at them and said, ‘If we can, we will’,” Lewis recalls. Oli was able to donate his kidneys and liver. For his parents, it meant knowing that even at the very end of his short life, their little boy was helping somebody else.

On September 29, the couple said their final goodbye before stepping into a hospital corridor. Lewis remembers stopping a nurse. “I said, ‘What happens now? What do we do now?’ “And she replied, ‘You go home’. That was the worst thing for me. She didn’t say it in a horrible way. What else could she say? But you’re in a world of the unknown.”

The couple returned home and began their search for answers. A police investigation followed and the case was considered by the Crown Prosecution Service, but no criminal charges were ultimately brought. Lewis says: “We still got no accountability. No one said sorry. No one said, ‘We got it wrong’.”

The inquest jury concluded Oli’s death was the result of misadventure. Before jurors retired, Area Coroner Katrina Hepburn told them there was “no evidence which would show failures by the nursery or its staff”. Staff also told the hearing they believed the food had been prepared appropriately, with Oli’s key worker saying she was “content” the pasta pieces she had chopped were small enough.

The family subsequently pursued a civil claim, which was eventually settled for a six-figure sum without an admission of liability. For Lewis and Zoe, the case had never simply been about compensation. “It was never about the money for us,” Lewis says. “We wanted accountability.”

They have used the financial security to help give their younger son Jake, now three, opportunities and experiences. Lewis describes it poignantly as “a gift from his big brother”. Jake has Oliver as his middle name and is growing up knowing about the brother he never got the chance to meet.

For now, his parents have found a gentle way of explaining it. “Oli lives in the clouds,” says Lewis. “Jake knows Oli is his brother. We want him very much to grow up knowing that he was wanted. He wasn’t there to fill a hole. He is Jake. He is his own person. Oli is his brother, but they’re equal.” There are reminders of Oli throughout the wider family, from treasured toys to keepsakes made from his clothes.

And then there is the biggest reminder of all: the foundation carrying his name. The Oliver Steeper Foundation was officially registered in 2023 and began supplying LifeVac anti-choking devices to childcare settings. The manually operated non-invasive instrument, which costs £60-85, can clear blocked airways when first aid fails.

The response to the charity has stunned the couple. “It went nuts,” Lewis says. “On the first day our Justgiving page had about £3,000.” That generosity has now helped the foundation distribute 2,000 kits. An interactive map on its website shows where they have gone, and Lewis says some parents even consult it when choosing childcare.

The couple currently take no salary or expenses from the charity, balancing the foundation around work and raising Jake. But its success poses another question: how much bigger could Oli’s legacy become?

“Next year we’re aiming to start schools,” Lewis says. He and Zoe hope that one day LifeVac devices will be in all schools; they have even taken their campaign to New York. For Zoe, there is something comforting in being with other parents. “They’re all up there somewhere calling the shots and we’re just basically doing what they’re telling us,” she smiles.

Four years after they lost him, their little boy who laughed at trees is still changing lives. His life lasted only nine months. His legacy is only just beginning.