To think people in the UK are very lax generally about children being left alone?

[Toxicityofourcity]

Not from the UK. Some of the threads on here baffle me when it comes to leaving children alone. Children as young as 10 and 11 getting themselves home from the school, bus etc and letting themselves into an empty house. Being left for a few hours on their own. Have just read a thread about a 16yr old being left for 4 days... because she has to mind some cats?!? WTF? I just don't understand. This is not something that's done in my country at all. Is it a cultural thing? Do people not worry about house fires, accidents, abductions etc.? I just really don't understand it. But here on MN it seems totally acceptable?

I think all those things sound reasonable. Where are you from? My 16 year old stays home and minds the house and the dogs and goes to school if I am away for a few days.

Good luck with calling Tulsa (CPS) after 4 pm on Friday! (Famous tragic case where people learnt you can forget support if it’s outside office hours)

I'm from the Netherlands and I walked to and from school by myself from age 9. Cycled 5 miles to secondary in the next town from age 11 and came home to an empty house because both my parents worked. Was very normal. I think you must live in a very sheltered corner of Ireland.

It’s easier to fly a child alone on Iberia than Ryanair or Aer Lingus. All my children flew to Madrid, with changeover to another destination at age 15 alone. Ryanair won’t take them, and AL want an adult drop off and indemnity document signed. Iberia requires nothing from age 12. They also take even younger children, which AL does not allow.

I'm Swedish and was living independently in a student flat at 16, as is very common here. Sweden is consistently top of the league table when it comes to children's wellbeing. Maybe the cultural difference is that your countries stifles the independence of young adults by treating them like toddlers.

*your country

The opposite for me aswell. In comparison to "back home" kids in the UK are much older when they make their way to school and back by themselves and are home alone for a few hours. Same with bedtimes.

But I've also noticed that in the UK (imo) the growing period is a lot shorter. Younger teens are not really expected to do anything while older teens are expected to have Saturday jobs and pay their way. Or could be just our social circle.

At 16 I was living away from home at an agricultural college and studying there, it was perfectly normal

Not sure what choice I have when my ds goes to senior school. He'll be 11 (12 in January) there is no afterschool childcare for this age. I will be home by 5pm. My dh has weekdays off some time or will be home by 4:30. We don't have family around to help us out. I was walking to and from senior school at this age but my mum didn't work so was at home. My dh was coming home to an empty house from the last year of primary. That was 30 years ago now!

Don't forget to add it was uphill. Both ways. Then we will live upto the Finnish parents/grandparents stories 😁

Even if there was childcare provided for 11 year olds (who I'm guessing is going to Secondary in September if you're in the UK), I think you'd have to have an extraordinarily biddable child who'd agree to be babysat after school at that age.

Your from Ireland? In which case I call total bollocks on your assertions. I'm the eldest of 8 and my parents (Roscommon and Cork).would happily leave us home alone from when I was around 9 or 10. All of us, with me in charge. Same with most of the kids I knew.

I stopped going on family holidays when I was 14 and would stay home alone with the dog, with the neighbours keeping an eye out. Mum would come home to 2 weeks worth of washing up but I managed to avoid burning the house down. Often I would have a friend or two staying for the fortnight, clearly their parents weren't bothered either.

The Tulsa document is guidance. It is not the law. Tulsa are way too overloaded to respond to reports that working parents allow a 12 year old let themselves in after school. And they can’t prosecute it either.

I think within Europe we are behind in letting our children have more independence. Schools here mostly encourage children to walk to and from school ( depending on where you live of course and the journey) at 10/11. I will leave my 10 yr old at home for 30 min occasionally and she has just started walking to school which is a 5 min walk away. So not really risking a huge amount there.

A lot of people I know from mostly Asian cultures are horrified at this though including my in laws! But I think growing up in Europe is very different to growing up in a lot of Asian countries.

Was very normal. I think you must live in a very sheltered corner of Ireland.

@pointythings Where we live, the nearest public bus stop is 15km away on a busy road with no hard shoulder, cycle lane or footpath. The nearest shop (and DS's school) to our house is 6km away, on a similar road. The only cyclists you see on those roads are the adults in lycra who cycle mostly in a group

To give you an idea of how isolated we are, when I put the bins out, the nearest collection point for our bins is 750m from our house. Even Tesco stops delivering about a mile away from my house!

I leave at 7.45am, and get home at 6.45 if traffic is good. I work 50km away in the nearest big town. Most families around have one parent doing likewise. School holidays are 9 weeks long for primary, and 12 or 13 for post-primary.

My city based colleague's kid was walking home from age 9 and letting himself in. But she got home an hour later, and if anything happened she was a 5 or 10 min drive from home. He could safely walk to the shop at the top of their street to get milk and home - even in winter because there's streetlights and people around. In the summer he could walk to various city summer camps and call in to his mum at work if he needed money or whatever.

I don't think it's an either/or. I'm no more protective of DS than my colleague was of hers, but what does make a big difference is the location and the amenities.

How on earth are your children going to learn how to be a grown up if they they're not even allowed to look after a cat for 4 days. Mine used to go on a public bus on a Saturday into the nearest town 10 miles away when they were about 12. They had to go with at least 1 friend and were given strict instructions about what to do and how to behave. My boys had mopeds at 16 and went all over the place locally. DS & friend drove to airport at 17, got on a plane to Scotland for a uni open day they fancied. Booked B&B, found the local buses etc and got home again without incident. Proud parent day!

Perfectly normal in Donegal, Kildare and Wexford.

What's with all the UK bashing threads at the minute?
UK should be over carpets
UK put dc to bed early
Now this one
We do us you do you simple.

Ps 16 is nearly an adult they will be getting a job very soon or starting college, should we baby our children forever?

Well if you look you'll see that I commented later that I'd swapped GB and UK iny post and blamed it on typing before having my coffee. The rest of my post was true.

DS is 11. I'm dovetailing with another mum friend - for the summer and hopefully ongoing until they are old enough.

She's in the office the two days a week that I'm at home and vice versa, so I'll have her DS for the days I WFH and she'll have my DS for the days she WFH. She's a toddler as well but the creche suits for that.

If your DH does some days WFH maybe he can team up with other parents likewise?

I mentioned upthread that me and my sister used to do exactly this, we just went home after school and chilled for a couple of hours. It was never an issue.

I started leaving my DD alone when I popped to the shops about a year ago when she was 11 and now we can pop out for a few hours knowing she'll be fine. It does help that I have family very close by so if she gets into any difficulty, she knows where to go.

My parents started leaving me at about 16 when they went on holiday and I was too cool to go with them (can't believe I missed out on really nice holidays to sit at home)

Honestly, if 11 year olds don't have the common sense to not burn the house down when being left for a small amount of time, then you've gone horrible wrong somewhere.

Sorry, I couldn't read anymore after the OP said she was from Ireland. Complete BS.

I'm from Ireland and always came home to an empty house when I was eleven, laid the fire and started the dinner.

This utopia that the OP is referring is one where there is always someone at home, which is a luxury in itself.

Sorry but I really don't think your experiences are reflective of Ireland. I was a primary school teacher in Dublin up til 4 years ago and it was very normal for kids to walk home from school by themselves from 3rd class up (so age 8/9), their parents just had to sign a note at the beginning of the year to say they wouldn't be getting collected from now on. Usually their parents would be working from home or else they'd walk to an after school activity nearby, so it wasn't like they were going home to an empty house, but once they were in 5th or 6th class they'd generally do their own thing, go off to the park or the shops or wherever. I'd often see them when I left hanging around in droves!

When I was a child I would let myself in from around the age of 9 or 10 and would be alone for maybe an hour before my mum got home from work. She had drummed it into me to go to the next door neighbour if anything happened or if I didn't feel safe, but generally I'd come home and watch TV or would just stay out playing in the estate. Got public transport to secondary school, got left alone the odd weekend from maybe 14, went abroad for ten days with my friends at 16.
I know you said you're not in Dublin and it's different rurally, but a lot of my friends in college were from the midlands, had skipped TY so started college at 17 and were very independent living away from home. I'd highly doubt their parents mollycoddled them growing up, afraid to leave them for any length of time etc!

I do think it’s funny that OP revealed the country where this is not normal is Ireland!! I was really expecting somewhere else much more dangerous and sheltered haha!