Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think it was Wilkinson's own fault that one of their shops was set alight by a work experience girl.

130 replies

IamHelenaJustina · 10/10/2014 16:23

Daily Telegraph link here Basically bored 15 yr old was left alone to stack shelves and set fire to cardboard to get out of it. Causing HUGE blaze and thankfully no injuries or loss of life. Obviously she is entirely responsible for the stupid and dangerous action and has been prosecuted accordingly.

BUT a part of me wonders what the heck the store staff were playing at. Work experience is not free labour. She should have been with staff learning about different roles and not bored out of her mind alone in a stock room. Or AIBU? Is that what work experience is for?

OP posts:
LurkingHusband · 10/10/2014 16:25

Work experience is not free labour

what a quaint idea ...

amyhamster · 10/10/2014 16:26

Well there's only so much they can job shadow and at the end of the day they are there to learn what the job is & if stacking shelves is part of it then no it's not unreasonable
Unless she was doing that all week & nothing else

VermillionPorcupine · 10/10/2014 16:28

To think it was Wilkinson's own fault that one of their shops was set alight by a work experience girl

YABU. VV U.

Their own fault? I hate my job sometimes, and my boss is a cunt. Does that mean it's my employers fault if I decide to go in and set fire to my desk?

Hmm
Mammanat222 · 10/10/2014 16:28

YABU, surely a 15 year old knows not to set fire to things regardless of how bored she is Shock

ThinkIveBeenHacked · 10/10/2014 16:28

Depends what their policy on Work Experience is or Lone Workers.

I did three separate work experiences in my school days and worked alone for at least half of the time - once you have been shown how to do a task you can at 15yo be expected to get on with it.

She was fucking idiotic if you ask me. And totally 100 percent to blame. If she were my DD id be supporting the prosecution and police as much as possible, and be totally mortified.

OwlCapone · 10/10/2014 16:28

So, it's the store's fault that the girl was a fucking idiot who burnt their store down?

WorraLiberty · 10/10/2014 16:31

Of course it's not Wilkinson's fault!! Hmm

Gileswithachainsaw · 10/10/2014 16:31

Well she was responsible for her own actions. BUT places really shouldn't take work experience on of there is nothing they can show them. There are dull parts to every job and I realise that there is alot that they can't let them do. Doesn't stop them explaining or teaching them about stuff or involving them rather than dumping them on tea and coffee duty or in store rooms the entire time.

That's all part of it sure. But I've been that WE person who was given all the shitty jobs and ignored the whole time and it's frickin miserable.

Places should only take them on of they are actually prepared to show them.a wide aspect of the jobs and encourage them to participate where possible.

Gileswithachainsaw · 10/10/2014 16:32

But I repeat she is responsible for her own actions.

Smilesandpiles · 10/10/2014 16:34

There is no way this was the stores fault.

It was the girls fault for being stupid, selfish and lazy. She put lives in danger because she couldn't be bothered to finish her shift. God help her if any potential employers see her in future and recognise her. She'll never get work.

PolkadotsAndMoonbeams · 10/10/2014 16:34

I'd be fed up stacking shelves on work experience - we were told it was a way to see where a career could go in the future, not just being used as an extra pair of hands (so not doing something you could feasibly do as a Saturday job). When I did it I was swapped between departments, shadowed a few different people etc. I was never left on my own. I would think if she was that bored, it wasn't just a one off.

Having said that, it was a very stupid thing to do.

ThinkIveBeenHacked · 10/10/2014 16:35

How can anyone extrapolate from that article that the girl was simply "dumped in the stock room all week"? For all we know she could have done tillwork, shop floor merchandising, hr and training info, customer service training etc. It simply states she was in the stock room that day alone. That doesnt mean it was a regular thing.

And if she didnt want to get experience if shopwork (of which stock room work is a good portion) then she should have been more pro-active and found some work experience in an industry she didnt feel inclined to burn down.

Original poster
IamHelenaJustina · 10/10/2014 16:35

I'm going on my own experience of WE and my daughter's. I was shown a variety of tasks and shadowed/participated in the varied weekly routine. I remember one afternoon when I was left to get on with a job by myself but I was in a building with other people and had a task with a finite beginning and end so it wasn't in any sense boring. I emerged with a lot of confidence in my ability to cope in an unfamiliar environment.
My daughter did her WE in a high street clothes retailer where they took the trouble to show her a variety of jobs including the mundane ones and gave her great feedback.
It's bad enough to be in a JOB where you are so bored you want to torch the place. It just shouldn't happen in work experience.

OP posts:
WorraLiberty · 10/10/2014 16:37

Nobody knows that she was ignored the whole time.

The story says it happened at a very busy time.

Most 15yr olds can be trusted to stack some shelves alone for a while, without turning into a pyromaniac.

PolkadotsAndMoonbeams · 10/10/2014 16:37

Posted too soon - I think they are right to prosecute, she should know better than to set something alight, but perhaps they should have a look at what people on work experience there end up doing.

She should have spoken to her school earlier really, and complained.

Whiskwarrior · 10/10/2014 16:37

For my work experience I was shoved off to WHSmith for two mind-numbingly dull weeks of learning exactly nothing. I hated every second of it and couldn't wait for it to be over.

At no point, through boredom, did I decide to set fire to anything.

This is 100% on the girl in question.

Gileswithachainsaw · 10/10/2014 16:38

Im not saying that's what happenedthere

Just talking in general about placements. Mine broke the law on a few counts Grin but at least that one involved me ive had others which treated me like a slave.

WorraLiberty · 10/10/2014 16:38

I'm going on my own experience of WE and my daughter's

Why??

This wasn't yours or your daughter's work experience, was it? Confused

EdithWeston · 10/10/2014 16:40

The article doesn't say she was alone when shelf-stacking, not does it say that shelf-stacking was the only activity during the placement.

It does say that CCTV showed she went alone to the cardboard storage area, re-emerged, and smoke started appearing shortly afterwards. That doesn't sound like someone messing around, but totally deliberate firestarting.

'I'm bored' is never an excuse for arson.

Nor is it Wilkinsons fault for being "boring"

Stratter5 · 10/10/2014 16:41

What? Seriously, she set fire to the shop, because she was bored?

Blimey. That's going to look good on her references Shock

waithorse · 10/10/2014 16:43

YABU. Setting fire to stuff because you're board is not normal behavior.

periperisun · 10/10/2014 16:44

I do think WE is daft and a waste of time but how that can be translated into "stores fault" I do not know.

Having read the article properly I do have a smidge of sympathy for the girl only because it seems that she didn't realise the chaos it would cause and she was just trying to create a diversion.

Only a smidge mind. Stupid!

WorraLiberty · 10/10/2014 16:46

Having read the article properly I do have a smidge of sympathy for the girl only because it seems that she didn't realise the chaos it would cause and she was just trying to create a diversion.

Oh come on, she's fifteen, not five!

Stratter5 · 10/10/2014 16:47

Oh come on, she's fifteen, not five!

Exactly!

Original poster
IamHelenaJustina · 10/10/2014 16:48

15 yr olds are frequently stupid and desperately self centred though. It's a funny age. I have to say Wilkinson's known behaviour with workfare candidates is influencing me in thinking they should have done better for this girl. Their response to the whole situation has been to stop taking WE placements altogether - so clearly they didn't feel this was a one off and supervison meant it would never happen again. It rather implies to me that their position was that there's no point having WE placements if you can't leave teens alone to stack shelves.........

OP posts: