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

[IamHelenaJustina]

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?

Oh come on, there has to be something more to this. Your typical 15yo doesn't go around starting fires in a shop, and a typical 15yo would also know it would be really obvious that it was her.

I reckon she must have some kind of SN or have history for this kind of thing, in which case she should have been more closely supervised, which presumably would have been the responsibility of her school tutor to let somebody know.

If neither of those things then

Fabulassie: businesses don't benefit from WE kids.
They take up valuable staff time that could be earning the businesses money.

The last we had was a complete pain. He kept telling 30 years olds that they were doing their job wrong.

We had another one with ADHD, she had a diet of chocolate and energy drinks. That was interesting.

luckily none have attempted to set the building alight.

YABU
She was on WE to experience what it's like in the world of work. Part of that experience will involved some mundane tasks because the majority of jobs are not exciting all of the time. I did my WE in a bank, it was incredibly dull, the most exciting bit was cleaning the ATM! Most kids just walk out if the don't like it they don't set fire to the place.

So the girl is described as intelligent..... I'm obviously a bit dim as I've never considered setting fire to anything in my life.
It does make me wonder though, how come a bright pupil was doing WE in Wilkinsons, Nothing wrong with shop work at all before anyone shouts about it. Just asking why there?
What are school aged WE students expecting to do while on WE? I'm sure 15 year olds will be limited by far more company regulation these days than most of us ever were.

Surely I am not the only person who had a permanent Saturday job when I was 15? I worked in M&S and there were loads of us from the local private schools who did the same without setting fire to anything (and, as far as I know, neither did the teens from the state schools!). It wasn't work experience, it was er... work. Yes, I was paid (1.23 per hour!) but even so, that isn't what stopped me from recklessly burning things and not caring what happened to colleagues and customers.
YABVU

My dd was offered work exp at Wilkinson's. She's very bright at was at grammar school (now in 3rd year Law at a RG university). Without wishing to sound MNish, she was labelled G and T at grammar school. Work experience is very hard for schools to come by in this economic climate. All work experience is valuable, even if it teaches you to get up early and be polite to customers. A job's a job and shouldn't be looked down on, however bright you are.

Dd turned it down because she found her own more job related placement. Luckily we know people in lots of areas of work. However, had she gone to Wilkinson's, she would have been polite and certainly non fire starterish.

The whole point of work experience is to learn what the world of work is like. Yes, it is sometime boring.

I had brilliant work experience in a path lab where I got to play around with real blood samples at the age of fifteen. Its depressing if work experience becomes so santized that children don't actually experience work.

This girl deserves to go to jail. Being bored is not a reason to put lives at risk. A fifteen year old is old enough to know that arson is a serious crime.

Y.A.B.U. In a major feeeekin way.
We all get bored but most of us would not endanger lives as a result. People could have been killed ffs.
Why didn't she just walk out. She has a criminal record now.

I wonder if she will be called "The Prodigy" at School.... after she is a Fire Starter...

Seriously that girl has got some mental issues and a custodial sentence to deal with.

I wonder if she will be called "The Prodigy" at School.... after she is a Fire Starter...

"Seriously that girl has got some mental issues and a custodial sentence to deal with."

Well she will be assessed by a pychiarist and I suppose the question is where she is locked up rather than IF she is locked up. I don't think that Broadmoor has a paediatric wing. There is no way that she can be allowed her freedom if her mental state means that she is likely to set fire to buildings. However inpatient pychiartic bed for children are about as far between as rocking horse shit.

I am just relieved that no one was killed.

It doesn't make any sense that the company have stopped all WE because of one person's disturbed behaviour, though.

YABU

I find the concept of having to do work experience stupid, though. IIRC, it's being phased out in Scotland.

Anyone who has done any form of retail work has spent time in the stock room. Work experience isn't about the glamorous tasks, it's about seeing what really goes on day to day in a job so you can decide if the job is right for you.

The last time I did a teacher work experience visit to a store that may possibly have been wilkos, the kids begged me to get them out of there.

Ah yes, I explained in kindly tones, pass yer GCSEs & you'll go to college & not be back here, doing this, for workfare. At least until you graduate from Uni...

It was pretty grim. The highlight of the week had apparently been a 15 minute go with the price stickering gun, before being sent back to the stockroom to shuffle dusty boxes about for another four days.

Nonetheless, as PPs have said, you throw a sicky, you don't set fire to the place!

Yab Very U.

I remember when I was 15, I had to do work experience stacking shelves. I was extremely hacked off about this, as I had turned down a fun residential trip away, as it was too close to my GCSEs, and I really wanted to spend the time revising. They then changed the rules, and forced me to do the work experience as "we'd got some spare places, and don't want to upset the businesses". I was so bored that I considered gnawing my own leg off, like an animal in a trap, in a bid to escape. I was so bored and hacked off that I was fantasising ingenious ways to get back at the person that had forced me to do it. And yet I didn't commit arson. Oddly enough, most people don't.

YABVVVU to blame wilkos. With regards to the young lady in question, if the judge is insisting upon psych evaluation, I think I will reserve my judgement. If there is a significant psych problem identified, then there might possibly be some blame on the school/family, for not spotting waring signs. But I still can't see how blame would fall on wilkos.

I did work experience at 14 and was asked back from time to time to 'man' the front desk. It was a small veterinary practice. Some days no one would come in and I'd be stuck there for 2 hours doing nothing. I didn't set fire to anything. Because, you know, I wasn't a delinquent.

The title of this thread is horrible. The onle one responsible for an arsonist attack is the arsonist themselves. It's not as though she was locked in a cell for 2 weeks.

There are lots of very boring jobs. Teenagers often like the idea of some jobs (cashier) but don't like the heavy or more background work that goes with it (shelf stacking).
DD found work experience related to apprenticeships she was interested in. Nothing I could say to her could convince her to work at her GCSEs and go down the A level route quite like 2 weeks of boring, repetitive, easy tasks alongside apprentices she couldn't relate to, who were really into what they were doing.

I had a varied and interesting work experience, but some of it included long, dull afternoons at an ancient, cranky, slow photocopier, stapling and sending out a monthly mail shot for hundreds of people. It was real work, I ended up doing similar in my gap year/ holiday job. Some work is mind numbingly dull.

I never had an intention of going into that industry, but it helped me think about what environment I wanted to work in which strengthened my resolve to enter the career that I'm in.

There may be mitigating mental health issues, but that doesn't pass responsibility on to anyone else. If boredom is a trigger for arson, it's a wonder that any school is left standing by a Monday lunchtime.

Ah, I see the subject of mental health has come up already. DD was very ill at the time. She was not a danger to others, though, and wouldn't have burned the place down. If there was any risk, it was to herself (losing some weight) and that was being managed by a team by then.

It doesn't make any sense that the company have stopped all WE because of one person's disturbed behaviour, though.

It maks perfect sense when that one person caused a MILLION pounds worth of damage AND ENDANGERED THE LIVES of the staff and customers.

at 15 I did 2 weeks WE in a mental hospital, a huge Victorian hospital building. It was a bit grim really, and they were understaffed.
We did a range of things from making the afternoon tea, chatting with the patients, helping them with crafts (one lady made loads and loads of pompoms all day long) to shadowing the nurses giving out medication, to taking patients in wheelchairs for physio or down to the TV lounges, and even, get this, we were allowed to take wheelchair bound residents out for a walk round the village and to the local shop UNSUPERVISED (now, that bit I am not too sure of, not sure I would like it if it were my elderly vulnerable relative being cared for by an unqualified 15yo) But, we did not dump them by the roadside and bunk off to the café or anything else, even though the residents could not have dobbed us in. we were responsible.

The girl was 15. 15 and supposedly intelligent. I cannot for one minute understand how she did not think through the possible consequences of her actions. She is bloody lucky no one was killed.

IN no way shape or form is this Wilkos fault.

I fail to see how the store is responsible. The very first thing kids are taught about fire is not to fucking play with it. It's not their fault this idiot didn't get the memo.

Most workers just slack and eat up the clock when they're bored. They don't light the place on fire.

That said, it also looks like she has a MH issue. After she's done doing community service/jail she should be required to have mandatory counseling.

Most jobs involve boring tasks that have to be done.
Actually I watched a film being made once and it was the most boring thing to observe (and the actors said filming is tedious beyond belief for them too 99% of the time).

Under NO circumstances is it OK to jazz up a dull day by setting fire to your workplace.

Frankly OP your stance on defending this entitled fool is beyond belief.