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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To report this to police

71 replies

Joovy · 17/08/2018 14:49

Via the local police surgery.

Child being left outside a pub for 5-10 minutes at a time on a pavement of a busy road. It happens almost daily and the child is about 10 months old. Yesterday people started asking if it was mine and I stayed with it until parent returned and pointed out they were bloody foolish and explained people had been concerned and that anything could happen.

I'm not sure if I should leave it or I should mention it to the police. It seems so freaking dangerous but is perhaps not illegal? Or am I being a busy body and should I just ignore it in future.

OP posts:

WaxOnFeckOff · 17/08/2018 16:13

Fishes I am one of 7, I think for my DM is was a fairly regular occurrence as she'd forget who she'd taken with her! If a neighbour was about often the babies would just be left at the flats rather than taken to the shops. Large council estate but everyone knew everyone I think. There is definitely no more risk now than then but we are just more aware of it I think. My DN was born in the late 70s and my DB and DSIL would leave him in the car with crisps and a drink while they went to the pub and he'd just be a toddler at the time.

cloudyweewee · 17/08/2018 16:13

I worry when i see dogs left outside shops so seeing a baby would really give a cause for concern.

Excited0803 · 17/08/2018 16:19

If I left the pushchair then I'd be taking the baby in with me. Leaving a baby is weird, people understand the dangers more these days. I'd report it and video the pram on its own.

Excited0803 · 17/08/2018 16:20

(Check the baby is in the pram first!)

ladydickisathingapparently · 17/08/2018 16:23

It did used to be quite usual. One of my earliest memories is being aged 3-4 and left outside shops holding onto my brothers pram and watching the cars whizz by. On one occasion an old lady came up and told me to hold her dog as well.

Doesn’t make it right now. A few years back I saw a boy of 4-5 wandering around alone on a busy road, he couldn’t tell me his name or where he lived. By a stroke of luck I saw a police officer at the cash point nearby and he came and picked up the little boy. He’d been sent out to play from a house half a mile away, parent couldn’t have given a crap where he was, and I was told a social services report would be made.

YouCantStopTheSignal · 17/08/2018 16:29

Loads of people leave their babies outside the shop where I live, lots of us leave them in the garden to sleep too, but it's not a major city.

It might not be drugs, it could be that she works there and she's collecting her tips from the night before. The pub where I worked when I was younger had a tips jar which would be counted and shared out, you could pick your share up whenever you liked or leave it until payday, some people collected theirs the day after each shift.

If you're concerned OP then call the local police station or have a word with the local PCSO, give them the days/times, and ask them to keep an eye out.

crunchymint · 17/08/2018 16:52

You know plenty of people take illegal drugs and SS do not intervene?

MyDirtyLittleSecret · 17/08/2018 17:01

You say you've now spoken to the parents so you can just wait and see if anything changes before calling the police I think.

It's probably not the point, but I'm wildly curious about what you are doing every day at the same time to be witnessing this. You can't just be passing otherwise how would you know how long the pram is being left there and you say you're not in a shop and you say people were asking if you were the parent - are you waiting for a bus?

Original poster

Joovy · 17/08/2018 17:09

@MyDirtyLittleSecret I was having a drink there yesterday. Actually several drinks. I had literally just arrived and brought my first drink, sat down, and was having a conversation.

I have at no point said I am there every day. I said almost daily, and it is on a route that I have to pass by almost daily, even if I don't stop for a drink.

OP posts:

DolorestheNewt · 17/08/2018 17:17

You know plenty of people take illegal drugs and SS do not intervene?

Of course, Crunchy, but they might if they found out that the parents in question were regularly leaving prams on the pavement and sodding off for 5-10 minutes.... it would make me worry in a city. I haven't lived in a village for 40 years, so less of an opinion on what happens there.

IfIWasABirdIdFlyIn2ACeilingFan · 17/08/2018 17:18

You know plenty of people take illegal drugs and SS do not intervene?

Even if they’re also leaving their Baby unattended on the street when they go to buy or sell their drugs?

MyDirtyLittleSecret · 17/08/2018 17:26

Like I said I was just curious, I like to get a bit of background. So, again, if you're just passing 'almost daily' (so sorry for misreading it as daily) how do you know how long the pram is there at other times other than yesterday when you were sitting having a drink close enough to the pram for passersby to assume it was yours?

Original poster

Joovy · 17/08/2018 17:34

@MyDirtyLittleSecret The way the street is arched so you can see the pub from quite a way away. Does that make sense? And, at other times I've been asked to watch the baby, as have others, but then there are times when it is just the baby and no one else.

OP posts:

RoboticSealpup · 17/08/2018 17:38

if you're just passing 'almost daily'... how do you know how long the pram is there?

And do you always pass by at the same time? Because otherwise that would suggest it happens several times a day. If you manage to see it every time you pass, I mean.

mumofone234 · 17/08/2018 17:39

I’d report it. And I may be being unfair, but I’d say that if they’re the type to leave a baby outside the pub there may be other and more serious instances of neglect going on that you don’t know about. It’s worth someone speaking to them.

Redcliff · 17/08/2018 17:42

Why wouldn't one of them stay outside with the pram and the other on go in? I'm assuming that there is outdoors bit where they can sit and have a drink from what you say.

Original poster

Joovy · 17/08/2018 17:46

It's one parent only; I have never seen the other parent.

And do you always pass by at the same time? Yep, pretty much.

OP posts:

ImAIdoot · 17/08/2018 18:00

Could be it's someone from a place where leaving babies outside is normal - it was all over the UK and Ireland in the past, so I guess it still is in some places. Sometimes people who are not used to a less safe secure place will be oblivious to what they need to do.

The fact it's a pub makes it more odd. I would consider reporting it, especially as City streets are not safe and drunk people (which I'm told you get coming out of pubs) can be clumsy, violent or prone to acting out the worst excesses of their MH issues or emotional state.

HollowTalk · 18/08/2018 12:21

Typical MN that the OP is now being questioned about her involvement in this.

scaryteacher · 18/08/2018 13:22

I think Jamie Bulger affected the way we left our kids outside places; it doesn't take a minute as we all saw.

emmyrose2000 · 20/08/2018 07:48

Don't people often leave babies in prams outside shops?
I've never once seen this in my life.

Like other posters, I too suspect drug deals, given the 5-10 minute time frames.

Definitely report to police and child services (whatever it's called).

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