This is my neck of the woods
Aye right they weren't hiding!
This route used to be my regular commute, I did once fall asleep myself after an especially hectic day at work and following a bad night with dd (nightmares) and was woken in Helensburgh  by the driver clearing the train, had to get a very expensive taxi home! 
It's a quiet train/route normally but they do check them quite thoroughly and I reckon the girls were stupidly hiding in order to avoid getting in bother over the lack of tickets! The layout of the trains means there are several places they could have been hiding and they could have moved about too and so moved from an unchecked location to one the driver considered checked there's only so much a driver can do
Mother is attempting to misdirect the blame.
My dd often on trains at that age here as were her friends and they would have known better than to muck about and hide!
Stupid wee girls!
If Dd had done this she'd have had a massive bollocking and been grounded for a month! Not least for putting me through all that worry! And for treating trains like toys!
In answer to your question op, no I wouldn't have reported 2 girls of this age for being on a train alone especially this locale/route quite a lot of kids of this age are on the trains as they're more reliable than the buses and not just for school but going to relatives etc too and no it hasn't particularly quietened due to Covid!
The last train isn't that late, around 10 Ish, so if they also looked older nobody would have batted an eye
Only person to blame is the kids
Nope! Parenting too, they shouldn't have even been out mixing should they?
I've no idea if Helensburgh services are driver only operation
They often are
The stations at this end (balloch end) are unmanned mostly, glasgow end is much more well monitored I'm surprised they weren't caught out that end - which suggests to me they're probably pretty streetwise, cocky and gobby! There's plenty transport police that end too and they don't muck about!
It’s fine got the girls not to have phones but surely there would be some internal alarm that could be triggered?
Well spotted, yes there is but if they didn't pull it until the station was closed nobody would know, this station isn't close to residences
but no I don't think it reasonable to expect them to look for hidden youngsters!
Neither do I and I think these 2 were deliberately being quite sneaky
The other girl's family is very quiet, I bet she is grounded and hearing, "I told you not to hang around with Amy"
Yep!
I’m assuming girls were upset
Haha! I'm not! I'm assuming they gobbed off to staff and were generally cheeky
I think that's too late for 12yr old children to be out
I agree but a lot of parents don't unfortunately
I bet people in the town who know the mum are rolling their eyes at this...
To say the least
As for them "hanging around together", aren't the rules different in Scotland for kids? yes they're stricter! Supposedly
And if they were wearing masks, I'd have struggled to work out that they were 12. good point
@BlokeHereInPeace yep sounds pretty accurate to me. It's only a matter of time until someone ends up seriously injured/ill or even dead and the parents are doing sod all!
Ah truth telling trolls
Slapping her about the coupon with the wet kipper of reality
but you'd really have to be trying hard to do it
I reckon it wasn't their first time, also likely they have been tipped off by others who've done similar as to where/how to hide!
but I’m a bit surprised that a trawl of Glasgow central’s CCTV did catch them going back through for the Dumbarton train, leading to a search of that train at Helensburgh well before the following morning
Well for starters it would be queen street! For another it's not a quick or simple thing to check cctv especially as the parents apparently didn't know they were on the train and the ticket barrier workers won't have known when they dealt with them probably as they're chasing kids off from jumping the turnstiles all day!
fare dodging pair perhaps had form pretty likely
CCTV has been reviewed and it turns out that staff did check the train twice. Looks like the girls were well hidden then.
Not at all surprised by this!
Situations like this are exactly why parents should be held accountable for their kids actions at least until the kids are old enough legally to be punished by the state.
These parents should get a fine at the very least