To Expect Parents To Be Held More Strongly To Account For Their Children's Behaviour?

[BigFatBully]

I believe that parents should be held more greatly to account for their children's unacceptable behaviour.

For a case study, take the sale of alcohol and the whole fining/prosecution situation that we have in the UK around under 18 year olds purchasing alcohol. The burden of responsibility should always fall to the parents to ensure that their child doesn't buy alcohol or attempt to, not the poor shopkeeper. It should be the parents who are fined if their child attempts to buy alcohol, not the sales agent. As it stands, we have a situation where grown adults can't legitimately buy alcohol without carrying a passport or driving licence on them, even if they are considerably above the age of legal drinking. I was talking to someone the other day who said that they were asked to prove that they aren't a child to buy a bottle of wine at 30 years old. It's a ludicrous situation. On a similar note, I was behind a 40+ woman in the queue at a toiletries store and she was asked to prove that she wasn't a child in order to buy a pair of tweezers.

I don't know what jurisdiction other Mumsnetters are in, but in the UK we have a problem with children behaving wholly unacceptably and the parents not bothering to do anything about it because of lack of accountability. In my city, there are areas where the bus services have had to be curtailed of an evening because someone's little "darlings" (I could use other words but they might not be in-keeping with forum rules) are throwing bricks, eggs and goodness knows what at the windows. Social services should investigate as soon as the police raise concerns about illegal behaviour. The parents should take the blame for this behaviour.

A couple of months ago, there was a girl in a city centre that I was in who was threatening grown ups with a knife, whilst riding a bicycle on a pedestrianised street. The "mother" later emerged from a bookmakers, seemingly off of her face on some kind of substance. I told the mother she should teach her child how to behave and what's not acceptable and the mother didn't seem to care less. If it was down to me, the "mother" would be charged with causing an affray by neglecting to control her child, who threatened people with a knife.

Being a parent is not an easy job, and it's not a part time job either. When my children are older, they will not be loitering outside shops and trying to buy alcohol or to encourage adults to buy for them. They shall certainly be treating others with due respect. They will not be on the streets, bored and vandalising property. My husband and I will encourage them to develop hobbies and interests, such as football, music, art, even cinema. We have planned to reduce our hours at work and budgeted for it, so that when the children become too old for our au-pair, that we can ensure that they aren't on the streets, getting up to mischief. We are going to educate our children on the law and the consequences of breaking the law. Of course, we allow them to play and let off steam. They do push boundaries occasionally but we always let them know that certain kinds of behaviour is unacceptable and will result in sanctions such as no internet access for a week, or even longer depending on the severity of the misbehaviour. We allow our children to play and they do occasionally act up or be a little 'cheeky' but they are well aware that there is a line that they do not cross.

What do you think about the matter of unacceptable behaviour of other people's children? Does it anger you that the parents aren't held accountable as much as they should? Are your own children ever guilty of behaving in an un-savoury manner? Vote in the poll and share your thoughts.

Golly gosh op, how abhorrent the behaviour you describe from all these ferel children. I do hope with your perfect parenting from your au pair/you, your little darlings dont turn into Kevin the Teenager on their 13th birthday. I imagine you never take them to that god forsaken McDonalds either, allow them mobile phones, online gaming or watch you tube for fear they might learn a swear word! 😱

we all try to be the best parents we can be. I cannot guarentee my children wont do something silly in their lifes. I shouldn’t be accountable for that!

i would say, if a child has SEN (adhd/asd etc) there is no support available from school/camhs etc. parents are left to struggle on. I think unless youve walked in their shoes, you cannot comment on their parenting. No one chooses to have a child that has these issues.

come back once the au pairs left and the teen years are in full swing as we will be dying to know how your perfect parenting plans going!

you don’t know what your children will be like as teenagers.

I was an angel… until I wasn’t and my mom had no clue. Yes she parented me but my friends and I were doing round robins about “sleepovers” and getting pissed in a park at midnight at 15.
parents are there to guide their children but if a teen wants to keep something secret they will 😂

Your parents let you stay at a friend's house without confirming this with their parents and checking that all was ok?

Oh my god you really are throwing money at it as a solution money many don’t have.

You talk about responsibility of parents in the same breath as au pair and theme parks.

yiu don’t have teenagers and you clearly don’t get how to parent them

Nobody wants to pay more tax more police and social services.

Quite rightly the sorts of kids who get into trouble will be looking at the adults getting away with crime (shoplifting etc) and copying because it looks like there are no repercussions and they know that as kids, their punishment won’t be as harsh as an adult.

You rightly can’t keep kids locked up at home. If a child is determined to leave the house then they will and a parent has no choice but to let them go. You can’t lock them out as punishment when they return - what do parents do? There is no help- CAMHS is a joke and kids prone to criminal behaviour aren’t going to cooperate with services anyway.

What about the adults who display antisocial behaviour? I don’t see druggies and drunks being “punished” (never mind their parents and guardians) and we live in a society where petty crime like shoplifting is rife.If you buy your child a weapon or supply drugs to them then there should be repercussions but stuff like that isn’t treated as bad anymore. For example parents who do drugs can easily get child contact when they split and there’s plenty of people on here who think that recreational drug taking isn’t a problem when there’s children across the world including in the Uk suffering because of the trade.

Do come back when your children are 15/16 and let us know how perfectly it's all going OP

Nobody wants to keep paying for adults to live off the dole, undergo re-habilitation for drugs and criminal offences and be constantly in the healthcare system with self-inflicted medical issues. Nipping unacceptable behaviour in the bud is a far less costly method than continuing to pay for problematic behaviour throughout adult life.

Buying children weapons and drugs isn't treated as bad anymore? Which jurisdiction are you in? In mine, the police would want more than a "word" if a parent was found to have done such a thing.

My mum was really strict, painstakingly so! It just made me more conniving so blaming the parents isn't always the actual answer.

I don't think it would have been worth involving social services in my mum's parenting skills because I'd managed to convince her I was staying at friends house when in fact, I was raving in a nightclub!!

The sale of alcohol to a child is the actual offence, hence why children are sent in to buy it to entrap shop keepers who do sell it to children.

You seem to have a very black and white view of how things should be and it's not really that simple. But this bit did make me giggle
"My husband and I will encourage them to develop hobbies and interests, such as football, music, art, even cinema."

My mum was a working class cleaner, I've turned out OK, happy, healthy, loving family. One the ladies who my mum worked for (very rich lived in Chelsea) had children going to the some of the best schools with wonderfully educational hobbies etc, and they still got into drugs, stole money from their family, had to eventually have interventions, rehab, one committed suicide whilst highly intoxicated, the other needed a chaperoning at his mother's funeral because his brain was just so addled from drugs. He looked like a tramp but poor, working class no hobby me was there to assist my mum and help pour the drinks to riches.

So from your conclusions, who was the better parent? My mum with me who didn't really have hobbies but did manage to sneak out on occasions or the rich lady whose kids went to Eton with lots of enriching hobbies to lead ones child on the path to righteousness and enlightenment??

Should social services have got involved in our families because I snuck out clubbing and the rich kid got high? Where would social services have found the extra funding to get involved when they can't keep babies like Baby P or Star Hobson alive?

When my children are older, they will not be loitering outside shops and trying to buy alcohol

Have literally only read as far as this in the op.

Good luck with that op!!😂😂😂

Being a parent is not an easy job, and it's not a part time job either. When my children are older, they will not be loitering outside shops and trying to buy alcohol or to encourage adults to buy for them.

’Mum, we’re late in school for a study session today’- job done. Or they go to a friend’s house, or sport. Easy to say you’ll know where they are all the time- we’re lucky in that we’re rural but you live near town I’d say it’s so hard. Most parents do try their best, there’s a huge jump between the average parent who has a kid who hangs around town and the child buying a knife or whose mum is stumbling out of a bookies

I’m in England. I’ve never heard of adults getting in trouble for being the source of their child’s drugs, cigarettes, alcohol….
There was a case in the US where the parents bought their child a gun and the child used it in a school shooting and the parents are in jail but it’s not the norm.
I remember reading how murdered child Baby P was in a house where there’s dog shit all over the walls and he’d been seen by social services and health professionals but the mother kept on been given chances- the threshold for intervention is insanely high because there’s no resources. Services keep on delaying intervention until it’s too late and the behaviour turns criminal.

So, are we supposed to lay down and accept it then? Perhaps the threshold for intervention should be lower. I would argue that if this were the case, then perhaps maybe poor Baby P might not have experienced half as much abuse as they did.

It's cheaper to take legal action against an unruly child's parents than it is to keep dealing with said child for their whole life once they reach adulthood. It costs on average, over £31,000 per year to imprison someone. When children aren't taught wrong from right, they grow up to be adults who don't know wrong from right and are constantly in and out of the criminal justice system, probation systems (which aren't cheap to run) and also, as many end up using dangerous drugs, they do use a lot of healthcare resources. HIV is something that is common amongst needle users. According to AidsMap, a life time treatment of HAART for someone with HIV costs the public purse an average of over £296,000. Then there is the cost of Universal Credit/Job Seeker's Allowance for these people who due to their behaviour are effectively un-employable. Do you still think it's not worth police spending more time to punish parents of children who break the law or for children's social services to be more stern with lazy parents/inadequate parents?

My parents were exactly like you, op.

I regret not cutting contact earlier than I did.

@BigFatBully I have lost exactly what it is you want and are so upset by as you keep throwing out different things and different points some of which are oxymorons.

here is the thing NOTHING is going to get some parents to step up and sometimes nothing is going to stop some taking a certain path

in the meantime until you get teenagers stop trying to say how easy it is to parent them as toddlers because they aren’t. And that are the is to prepare them for life as an adult which means giving them autonomy

There is a term I rather like which from memory is from the Merchant Shipping Acts, Actual fault or privity

Is there anything a parent knows about or should have known about what their children were doing and could have taken action over

As a for example many years ago I was coming home from the allotment and two lads emerged from a house on mopeds they were clearly too young to drive

Mum and Dad were polishing their Merc so clearly knew what was going on

Clearly they should be held responsible

On the other hand if their kids had been doing the same but at a friend's then it's a different matter

I outlined what I think should be done clearly in posts 1, 5 and 14, all of which can be found on this thread. I also said on this page that the threshold for intervention should be lower than it is. I think I've made what I would like to happen very clear. I am sure there are things outlined that might not be possible due to red tape but I reckon some of it could be possible and Parliament should consider making things possible, such as spending money enforcing against lousy parenting rather than spending over £300,000 per child in later life when they go on to live a life of crime and disorder.

As for your point regarding my children not being teenagers, I am a member of society. I don't want to doxx my family but my brother and his wife and their two babies had to move house because of being tormented by teenage thugs whose parents were nowhere to be seen. When it affects my family, it affects me and I will give my opinion on the matter to anyone who will listen. The majority of parents DO the right thing, so why should the majority of society have to suffer the neglect of parents who don't do the right thing?

Children can't go and buy alcohol if you send them to school with a packed lunch instead of pocket money. Children don't have time to go vandalizing bus shelters and terrorising old ladies if they are busy pursuing a hobby. When the standard rules of discipline fail, you have to consider practicalities. Confiscate their electric scooters so that they can't go garden hopping and stealing people's valuables. Work out who the wrong crowds are when they go in to secondary school and don't invite the naughty kids to birthday parties etc, as they will only be a bad influence. That's not even parenting, it's basic logic and common sense that any adult should have.

Some teens dont want to pursue a hobby. Mine dont. They did off and on hobbies of football/swimming/skateboarding/guitar/boxing/bmx/scouts/piano etc when younger. I have the money and means to get them to a hobby but they just dont want to. I cant force them 😑

as a mum of a well behaved lad teen, i would say we need more youth club / scouts but not scouts - similar but in a cool setting where they are adult led skills type clubs. Lads love all the off roading/fixing bikes and generally making stuff. If there were places that could offer that, i reckon that would give teens a sense of purpose/keep them busy from hanging around the streets

@BigFatBully some of it could be possible?

the thing is the teenagers who are like this either have parents who don’t care and this wouldn’t be a deterrent or do care and have tried their hardest and are at a loss.

both need intervention and support yes. But it is hard to get and find.

i Kind of agree with hobbies in that youth centres/drop in places were helpful but funding has all but eradicated them which is a shame and is part of the problem. They do have nowhere to go and teenagers want to be with their peers

I can't believe I'm responding to this nonsense again, but here we go.

You cannot enforce parenting to taste by giving them a one-off fine that you can set against your notional cost to society.

You cannot expect Social Services to solve everyone's problems. We were referred to the Drug and Alcohol team. My 16 year old refused to engage. How would you have forced him? How would you have punished me? What do you think the outcome would be?

Children can find the time to get involved in all sorts of behaviour, despite having a "hobby". He played several sports. Still did stupid things.

"Don't invite the naughty kids to birthday parties." Seriously? You think "the naughty kids" are going to birthday parties?

I knew exactly who the dodgy kids were so I asked school to separate him from them. He found other dodgy kids. Then he was the dodgy kid.

I referred my youngest child to the Safeguarding Team at school so that they would keep an extra eye on him while our small, safe family went up in flames.

You have no idea. You just have no idea.

The solution is for the OP to write a parenting book with advice for various scenarios.

That's the thing though. The Government should encourage the parent's who don't care TO actually care about their child's behaviour. That is done by holding them to account legally for their children's actions. It sounds like you did care when raising your children and it sounds like you do actually care about the outlook for children in the future but there are a lot of parents who don't care that their child knows right from wrong. I seem to recall a case in Doncaster where two young boys murdered and tortured another boy, a horrific case. When one of the murderer boys' mother was asked what she thought about the atrocious crime her child had committed against another child, her response was something along the lines of "it's nowt to do with me". 'Nowt' is a Yorkshire slang word for nothing, I believe. Apparently, she had to be taken in to discreet protection after making that comment, so I heard at the time.

Your example that shop keepers shouldn't have to ID people for alcohol and other age restricted products is absolutely ludicrous! Of course they should! And if they didn't, it would only make the problem you complain about worse. People getting IDed at 40 is not the norm either.

And good luck being with your children 24/7 once they are 15/16/17. If you do manage it, they certainly won't thank you for it! It might just make them actively rebell from all you teach them.

Of course parents should parent their children, teach them right from wrong, the law, consequences of their actions etc. But they are their own people too and they are influenced by .ore than just their parents. Just because you teach someone something doesn't mean they won't make stupid decisions from time to time. Particularly when they are still young and still learning for themselves.

Sadly there are underclass criminal types who are not going to care don’t care themselves so their kids don’t care either. They are likely already known to SS and the police.

Parents like span and my friends are in a different place. A place I hope you never find yourself in but frankly could happen to any of us.

@BigFatBully

Intelligence isn't just knowing what you know, but also knowing what you don't know.

And you know diddly squat about parenting teens.

One of my friends dc went from grade 5 instrument and county level sport to exclusion and drugs within 6 months.