to thing that having child number 5 when living in a small 2 bed flat is unfair to all the children.

[byanymeans]

I totally understand that it is in all honesty none of my business how many kids people choose to have, as long as the parents can provide from them. However I really do find it a bit hard to get my head around how one family of 4 kids 2 adults could fit into a 2 bed flat before but last week they came home with baby number 5.

I just don't get how the parents feel this arrangement of 4 kids (oldest child is 13, some boy some girls) sharing a bed room is healthy. They must have no real play space or personal space. I just don't understand why you would want to bring another child into that?

I feel so sorry for the new couple who live below to as the noise from so many feet run around must drive them mad. I don't think that any one has lasted more the 9 months in the flat bellow for years.

I just don't understand they see nothing wrong this having still more without moving it?s not fair on any of the kids.

Don't give a stuff except if I am being forced to pay for it via the tax system. If they pay let the get on with it, otherwise AFAIAC its child abuse.

Thisisyesterday - I could be wrong, but I think th OP did mention that she and this family and everyone inthe building, apart from the frequently moving occupants of the flat below are council tennants. So not an assumption.

lockets

You are right - it's the old mumsnet double standard.

OMG Council tenants

Well that makes all the difference

Its either child abuse or it isnt. What the feck have your taxes got to do with it?

What a mad thing to say.

We have two three small-ish bedrooms and I've often wondered how many children I could get away with :) We've got two bathrooms, though, and one of th

Crap! My laptop is so touchy.

Anyway, what I meant to say is that one of them could be turned into a bedroom if need be.

Not one person has mentioned that the councils are under MASSIVE strain, so it may well be that that person is trying (unsuccessfully) to apply for a bigger house. Councils have certain priorities and it might just be that there are not any houses available.......

Five children in a two bedroom house is daft but perhaps they believe that an extra child will mean they get a bigger house given to them plus more benefits.

In an ideal world people would only have the amount of children that they had the space for (where each can have privacy and quiet space for homework etc), the amount that they had enough time to still do one to one things and allow each to pursue their own hobbies and of course an amount that they can support without state assistance.

Sadly, we throw so many benefits at people that children are seen as a way of getting a house, extra income or a way out of working.

It is mumsnet that is why people are commenting.

This website thrives on people slagging of other peoples circumstances. If you took all the AIBU threads out it would be a very slow website.

Of course it is none of our business what other people do and I could not care less if 20 kids are in one room because although I don't think it is right there is not a lot I can do about it,
but if the only reply was ''it is none of our business'' post after post that would make an interesting website would'nt it?

or maybe some folk just like bigger families and have different priorities in life than having a big house (with a bedroom per child and playroom, guest room), nice car, expensive hobbies , expensive holidays.

Can people really not get that very few folk in the world can get or actually think it's necessary to have all these things.

oldmumsy you stupid wanker

That post of yours is so risible it is nearly funny.

Benefits and overcrowded house - child abuse
No benefits and overcrowded house - fine and dandy

No, anything else ischild abuse apparently

I think the family will have a hard time and a great time in equal measure. I'm sure many if the kids will not do what their parents have done, because the situation is unlikely to be eithout its pressures and stresses.

But it's hardly a reason to start accusing the parents of being scroungers and child abusers.

I know families who have bought big period houses that they are now struggling to keep and only use part of them as they cannot heat the whole house. They only use 2 rooms and kitchen. Some of them have aupair aswell sharing the space. Or many families who live in 'building sites', using only 2 rooms while they renovate their investment forever. But i guess oldmumsy would say that this is different.

When I was a kid the neigbours lived in a 4 bed house and had 7 kids and then fostered 2 more. So social services couldn't have thought it was a problem.

Its laughable that peop;e keep talking about larger families sharing "in the 40's" and so on! Try the 80's, the 90's.....I have friends who, for example, are one of 9 kids in a 3 bed house, or 6 in a 2 bed, or in one case, 14 in a 4 bed. Ireland in the 1980's and 90's, these people are in their thirties, not pensioners!

So fucking what if kids don't have their own bedrooms, how bizarre to see this as some kind of fundamental human right!

I grew up in the 70/80's and we all had our own rooms. Allmy cousins did all my friends did.

So I suppose it was how you were brought up I think it is normal to have your own bedroom and not to be all crowded into one room.

If the child was honest I would expect they would want their own rrom as well.

Sharing with one other is doable but sharing with three or four ....come on you can't think that is right?

I also have three girls in one room 6, 4 and 2. I know they would want to share even if we moved to a bigger place. Friend also gas three girls and enough room to give one her own room but the girls prefer to share. I am sure it'll be different in their teens though.

My girls live a life of endless negotiation over space and toys etc. They learn Machiavellian tactics in negotiation and debate. I am often awed by the debating skills of the 4 year old. They are socially very aware. They are also very close and it's lovely to hear them cackling together just before they go off to sleep, or the eldest reading to the little one, or getting her out of her cot to play.

We are not benefits claimants though, so obviously It's All Fine.

'If the child was honest I would expect they would want their own rrom as well.

Sharing with one other is doable but sharing with three or four ....come on you can't think that is right?'

I never wanted my own room. I remember once I slept in my cousin's room on my own when he was away with his mum. I hated it.

And I was a teen at the time, too.