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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

AIBU: I don't want my cleaner to bring her child to work

179 replies

wouldwelcomeadvice · 16/04/2012 15:32

The cleaner has brought her child (age 6) into the country in the last few days and she is not yet registered at a school. She has brought her to work, in my house, today without asking me first. The child has been coughing away. I have three children and I don't need them getting ill. The child is well behaved and has just fallen asleep on the couch. AIBU. I just don't want any more bodies in my house.

OP posts:
complexo · 16/04/2012 22:12

Give OP a break.
She has been generous trying to help a foreigner woman who is probably an illegal immigrant and even paying £10/hour for a bit of dish washing and hoovering and has to put up with a strange child possibly with TB or a dangerous foreigner virus/bacteria, putting the whole family and specially her precious children at risk of catching it.
Was the child quiet OP?
Possibly she was up to no good, did you check if anything was stolen??
And please make sure you get that couch desinfected with Detox spray and any toys that disgusting child touched...don't forget the remote control.
Make sure your next cleaner is childless too so she won't let you down on school holidays, inset days, teacher's strikes or in case their children is coughing too much to be sent to school.
The cheeky of some people, trying to look after their own children while earning a living scrubing toilets. Anyway, how dare your cleaner bring another body into this country, another body into our oversubscribed school system, hopefully she won't get a place.
Have you considered contacting the border control?

Cremeeggsandkitkatsoldiers · 16/04/2012 22:16

she should have asked, but I went to work with my mum during the holidays, the nursery manager where my son goes brings her kids to evening meetings (they're lovely), someone at my work brought their kid to work last week. DH went to work with his father (and worked) from a young age when not in school.

So YABU overall

Tryharder · 16/04/2012 22:22

My parent's next-door-neighbour's cleaner brings her dog with her when she comes to clean. My parent's next door neighbour takes it for a walk Grin.

This wouldn't bother me at all. Were your children at home, OP? Why did they not play with this little girl?

Bogeyface · 16/04/2012 22:25

What a stupid Q TryHArder!

I mean FFS are you really THAT THICK?! THEY MIGHT CATCH FOREIGN!!!!! Worse than that, they might catch CHILD-OF-A-CLEANER-FOREIGN!!!

The OP cant risk that!

RevoltingPeasant · 16/04/2012 22:33

Did you know that you can actually become foreign if you spend enough time around them? You grow a beard and stop being able to pronounce 'th' and everything.

Troo fact.

Dozer · 16/04/2012 22:33

Frst time have had a post deleted by MN! Wine

Weird that it seems to be OK by MNHQ for posters to say that their blood runs cold because people like the OP exist, but not to say that OP was being a dick.

(note, the insult was labelling the behaviour not the person, surely in line with MN parenting advice?)

Or is male genetalia not preferred (am too prissy to use the C-word)?

Or are only more cleverly-worded insults are allowed?

Or calling adulturous partners behaviour dick-like, but not AIBU OPs?

Bogeyface · 16/04/2012 22:35

I read that too Revolting, its just not worth the risk is it?

knackeredmother · 16/04/2012 22:40

I think people are being unnecessarily harsh on the OP. There seems to be an inherent dislike on MN of anyone with a cleaner or a nanny.

complexo · 16/04/2012 22:41

Imagine if OP's children start playing with cleaner's child and caught TB or foreign accent!!!
What would OP's friends say during playdates and birthday parties?!
She can't risk that either

BabsJansen · 16/04/2012 22:45

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Original poster
wouldwelcomeadvice · 16/04/2012 22:45

Well. This has been an experience. This was my first ever post. I can't be bothered to counter every single accusation against me but to clarify a few points:
I believe I treat my cleaners (yes, I have had a few) very well. The current cleaner is my former cleaner's sister (she left to become a cleaner/nanny with just one family). I pay above the rate they asked me to pay. I have increased their salaries every year without being asked. I pay holiday pay and sick pay. I give bonuses every year. I give presents. I have always treated them the same as any other person I meet and have remained friendly with past cleaners, inviting them to family parties, etc.
The current cleaner does not speak English at all well. I type things into Google translate simply so that I can communicate with her. I have given loads of feedback about the standard of her cleaning. I spent time with her sister explaining the school system in London as I knew my cleaner was thinking about bringing her child to the UK. She could have had the courtesy to let me know she planned to bring the child to my house.

Regarding the cough. It didn't even occur to me to worry "where the cough is from". I generally cancel playdates if either mine or any other child is remotely ill. One of my children has a weak immune system.
I agree that my message seem to "dehumanise her" but this was because I did not want to identify her or her child in any way.

OP posts:
complexo · 16/04/2012 22:46

knackeredmother
only if the cleaner or nanny are foriner and have at leats one child with TB or nasty foriner bug and bring them to work

ApocalypseThen · 16/04/2012 22:46

Also, extra body in house. Wear and tear. Not in the budget.

Birdsgottafly · 16/04/2012 22:49

I think people are being unnecessarily harsh on the OP. There seems to be an inherent dislike on MN of anyone with a cleaner or a nanny.

No just a dislike, of firstly, someone who sees a child reunited with it's mother, in a strange country as 'another body'.

Secondly, someone who cannot help a mother out, who has left her home country to find work and is finally able to bring her child to live with her, for a short while.

There is a lot of support for EU economic immigrants coming to the UK to find work, across, MN, but the reality often is that they make harsh sacrifices in the form of leaving their family, including children and being completely alone, with little, or no, support.

complexo · 16/04/2012 22:50

Ok OP
We understand now......

MarianneM · 16/04/2012 22:51

I have given loads of feedback about the standard of her cleaning.

I bet you have.

"It's a different world down there below knee level, one that few adults voluntarily enter. Here you find elaborate dust structures held together by a scaffolding of dog hair; dried bits of pasta glued to the floor by their sauce; the congealed remains of gravies, jellies, contraceptive creams, vomit and urine. Sometimes, too, you encounter some fragment of a human being: a child's legs, stamping by in disgust because the cleaner is still there when he gets home from school; more commonly, the electrolysed calves of the female homeowner. Look up and you may find this person staring at you, arms folded, in anticipation of an overlooked stain."

Birdsgottafly · 16/04/2012 22:54

Op- tackle the standard of cleaning and give a deadline for thistiimprove.

If you can find it within you, i would allow for the child, but give timescales, after all, it is in the child's best interests to be in school and i would not aid and a bet a child not attending.

You could speak to her sister if there is a language barrier.

Bogeyface · 16/04/2012 22:56

OP, if you had have to leave the UK for say....6 months in order to support your family and not have them homeless or destitute, would you want to be seperated from your DC even for a second when you finally got to see them?

And dont forget that this DC is going to be so traumatised over the changes in her life that she wont want to be seperated from her mother.

You are so lacking in empathy and sisterly understanding that I am astounded.

That poor little girl, 6 years old FGS, was just "another body" in your house, not a small frightened child who needed her mummy, and its actually really upset me that you could see her like that :(

bringbacksideburns · 16/04/2012 23:02

Hmmmm. I wonder why she didn't mention it to you.

She was probably worried that if she didn't turn up you would fire her.
She probably brought her child into work because she had no choice.

Sometimes i look on here and it is like another world. And not a very nice one.

Dozer · 16/04/2012 23:06

Keep digging OP.....

complexo · 16/04/2012 23:07

No Bogeyface you are wrong
Read OP's last post
She just didn't want to identify the cleaner and her child in case we ever employ her cleaner and she brings her child with her
After all she is not even a good cleaner anyway

Bogeyface · 16/04/2012 23:11

Fair point Complexo.

As an aside and totally unrelated, has anyone else read "The Help"?

Natasugar · 16/04/2012 23:15

This an interesting one your a mother of 3 children and you have time to go around the house and in inspect the work your cleaner has done?
You also mentioned her work got worse over easter this wasn't by any chance the time when her child first arrived in the country was it.
Clearly your cleaner had no one else to to leave her daughter with.
You say you didn't want your children getting sick however did you not consider that this child might not even be registered with a doctor yet. I am very sorry but you come across as a very selfish individual.

Birdsgottafly · 16/04/2012 23:16

OP- i also think that you should stop congratulating yourself from providing the employment standards that every worker should enjoy, in the UK, even if others don't.

ilikecandyandrunning · 16/04/2012 23:47

Blimey! A lot of posters are being unnescesarily harsh to the op