Aibu to worry about handing a child to their parent who's clearly been drinking

[OopsDearyMe]

My dd 8 had a playdate today her mum told me that her dad would collect. The parents aren't together due to alcahol problems.
When the dad arrived he wreaked of alcahol, struggled with eye contact and his eyes were bloodshot.
I let her go but now I'm wondering if I should have told the mum ?
Mum was out on a girls night herself.
Was I right?

Me and my friend met up in town the other day for lunch with our DCs. We had a couple of glasses of wine, were definitely over the drink drive limit. Should someone have taken our kids off us?

me and my friend did that years ago Sweet when ds1 now 10 was about two and her daughter was the same age we both had a couple of glasses of wine and my dh picked us both up, my friend had to pick her older daughter up from nursery she probably smelt of alcohol too

Well I'm not sure the child being reluctant would ring alarm bells to me to be honest. My DS is always reluctant to go to their Dads (nothing of concern, unless you call it deeply concerning that daddy doesn't know how to use the bloody WiFi! ). I don't prevent him from going and he's fine when there ans when he comes back to mine, in fact he's that fine when there he then becomes reluctant to come back home! No drinking concerns here either, I'm practically teetotal.

FWIW. I've known a Mum do school pickup pissed, mainly because she was that drunk she was telling everyone in the playground she was pissed, and acted like it too, the school happily let her pick her DCs up and go home. I'm not condoning it, I'm just saying I don't think there'd have been a legal way or keeping the child until mum could get them anyway.

I think a slight smell of alcohol from a couple of glasses of wine is a bit different to 'reeking' of alcohol, whilst displaying other symptoms of intoxication. And I think we all know that really.

It is an offence to be drunk and in charge of a child under the age of 7. Schools can, and do, refuse to let children go home with parents/carers who are clearly intoxicated. OP, I'm sure if he was stocious that you would have suggested that may be the wee one should stay a bit longer or overnight and you have probably done right thing by texting the mum.
As for not being eager to leave, my youngest hides behind furniture and under tables when I go to pick him up from places....

If you were sure he was drunk and you feared for your, his or someone else safety you may use reasonable force to prevent injury.

It is like seeing someone intending to attack a third party you can intervene to prevent it - in this case the weapon is a car driven by a driver you reasonably consider to be drunk. There is a clear danger were he to drive off to himself, the child and anyone else. That is why landlords who take customers keys away don't get prosecuted.

You could phone police and they can do a welfare check on the child. That is reasonable to me, seems your gut was telling you something.

Over the legal alcohol/driving limit. And before you get your knickers in a twist I know he wasn't driving but once over the 'safe' limit for driving you're deemed unfit for work, operating machinery etc and I'm pretty sure the police would declare unsafe in charge of a child

No, they wouldn't, not having had two units! Many many parents have two or three glasses of wine on a Sat night and would be right over the drink drive limit which is set quite low, but are still parenting just fine (as long as not driving).

I think being drunk in charge of a child is an old law, applies to public places but not to homes- anyway, you'd have to get the police out to get them arrested anyway.

Nothing is stopping you reporting the parent to social services if you are genuinely concerned with ongoing neglect once the door has shut.

If the person was unable to stand/walk properly/slurred speech, that's a bit different than smelling of alcohol/having bloodshot eyes. The latter indicates an ongoing drink problem, but it doesn't really tell you just how drunk they were at that time point.

It sounds like his drink problem is not solved, and the best thing now is to have a chat with the mum in the next day or two, she may have already alerted school/social services herself to try and get access reduced (and failed), you don't know.

But how exactly would you do that CD? Would you ask him for his keys? And if he refused? Wrestle them off him? Stand in front of his car?

I've found this "Schools do not have the authority legally to retain a child against a parent/carer’s will; therefore if this is not possible, then the school should consider ringing for a Police welfare check on the non-emergency number, 101." In the document in the photo. (It won't let me save the link for some reason, I had to save it to my iBooks to read) is from 2012 so maybe the law has changed since then.

i have had half a bottle of wine now i would be over the driving limit[cant drive anyway as i never passed my test] but my children are safe in my care .

Zilpha is right: our training on safeguarding says that we can't refuse to hand over a child to a parent with parental responsibility. We can try and persuade them to wait for the other parent but we can't refuse to hand them over.

First of all, we're not qualified to assess the suitability of the parent. The OP is subjective when she says he was "reeking of alcohol" and it doesn't necessarily follow that he was incapable of looking after the child.

Secondly, you risk this person becoming violent. It's probably that refusing to hand over his child will antagonise him. He's likely to protest strongly, even attack you - do you have other children present?
He then takes the child anyway, and he's not only drunk but he's now extremely agitated. You've just made the whole situation very much worse for the child you are trying to protect and put yourself and any other child present at risk.

Much safer to let him take the child, then contact the other parent or the authorities and let them deal with it.

So far no response. I'm going to maybe have a quiet chat when I see her next and let her know how he was.
The girls behaviour sadly was that of someone used to her dad in the condition and was disappointed or ashamed maybe. She was perkier at first then almost immediately began to sigh and looked as I said dispirited.

My ex partner has conditions attached to any time spent with mine. So my concern was also that this might also be true but the mum didn't say beforehand so I'm assuming not.

Its really sad as my dd has since told me the girl rarely sees her dad and he's often unreliable.

Have been in a similar situation at work. Parent comes into pub I work in (already drunk) and is terribly rude and abrasive to all really, including his child (3/4) I refused to serve him alcohol (due to already being intoxicated) and got verbal from him. He left with the child (crying he was hungry and with no coat and this was feb)
I rang 101 and reported that I thought the child was at risk as father drunk. Glad I did, they found him fast asleep on a bench in town with the kid shivering next to him. Police interviewed me and I asked if I should have tried to stop him taking the child, they said sadly no, in the eyes of the law unless the child was in immediate danger to life such as being abused physically, in front of me, I would have been in the wrong, and they could have arrested me for it. They said I'd been right to do what I did.
Had I known mum I'd have maybe contacted her first.
Horrible situation to be put in OP, but from what I was told you'd have been in trouble yourself for refusing to let dad take her.
To answer your AIBU - YANBU to worry - means you care.

www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/news/crime/blackpool-from-the-courts-27-04-17-1-8513627

You can be charged and lose your children for being drunk in charge of children. This woman has her kids back now but how traumatic for the kids.

It is an offence to be drunk and in charge of a child under the age of 7

I never knew that, and I do a mandatory child safeguarding course every 2 years!

DSS and his partner have had to have a stern word with DP's ex about her drinking. She describes herself as a functioning alcoholic, and they said they would not allow her to have their daughter at her home unless she cleaned up her act, which she did.

I agree that you probably couldn't really detain the child but i probably would have felt I needed to phone her mum.

Safeguarding training does state the legal position is we have no right to not hand children over to parents if they are drunk
The only time we would be legally entitled to do this is if we thought the child was at immediate risk of harm. In which case we would be ringing 999 anyway so the police would be there to sort it out
However our company director has said he will support us in any legal proceedings as a result of refusing to hand over a child to a drunk parent
Because the safety of children is paramount
However, this is a difference between falling down drunk and jhaving had a drink
I had 2 glasses of prosecco at lunchtime this week and then went back to run my nursery. My manager actually bought them for me, I was going to have lemonade!

Insancerre, presumably you had no responsibility over the children for the afternoon?

Wow. I would withdraw my children from a nursery if I smelt alcohol on any of the staff. An awful lot of workplaces ban any consumption of alcohol during working hours and often that's just offices where people are only responsible for spreadsheets and databases. Majorly, majorly unacceptable to drink if you're being paid to look after other people's children. If parent's choose to drink while they're looking after their kids that's their look out. But if they're paying for a sober responsible person to look after their kids it's out of order to take the decision to allow them to be in the charge of someone who's been drinking out of their hands.

Of course I don't have any responsibility for the children
I tidied the office then went home early
I'm not that irresponsible
The children were perfectly safe

Wow. I would withdraw my children from a nursery if I smelt alcohol on any of the staff.

Me too! Im amazed that someone in charge of a whole nursery would decide to drink alcohol part way through their shift. That's a major lapse in judgement and I would remove my children immediately and make a formal complaint if I found out.

Insancerre has said she is the manager and not responsible for the day to day personal care of the children.

Presumably those condemning her would never touch a drop of alcohol while they are working, under any circumstances? Will they condemn the presence of 9 (subsidised!) bars in the Houses of Parliament, frequented by those responsible for running the whole country?

zilphas

You've missed the point so badly you might as well have just landed on the moon.

Are you seriously telling me that you'd hand a child back to someone who was drunk?

Away you go and come back when you can see some sense

I hadn't noticed that second post when I wrote mine. But I still think it's completely unprofessional and I would look for an alternative child care provider. Tanith no I never drank at work, especially when I was in senior positions. It's very unprofessional I think to come back from your lunch break smelling like booze. And of course I don't agree with MPs drinking during the working day whilst we pick up the tab but that has got diddly squat to do with this thread.

What a useful contribution to a discussion that (if you had read the thread you would see) has already been had. Just incase you can't be arsed, I would have no right to hold someone else's child without their permission so yes, I would hand them back. I would have to. I would also have to report my concerns to the police and/or social services and certainly the other parent if there was one. Unless it was an immediate emergency (like knife wielding druggie upthread) then I would have no choice but to give that child to their parent. Ive missed no point at all. Unlike you.