AIBU to keep reporting my sister over concerns for her children?

[Pipiscoming2023]

I live the other side of the country to my brother and sister, but keep in touch regularly with my brother and his family. My sister, however, doesn’t reply to any of my texts, won’t see me whenever I’m that way visiting etc.

The issue is she’s an alcoholic and she’s constantly in trouble. Shes 28 and has 4 kids, one of which is a new baby, and she’s back on the drink (and my brother thinks drugs too).

I get screenshots sent to me by one of my cousins who also lives near them, of things my sister is saying, videos of her drunk and fighting, just all the worst things.

My biggest worry is for those children. Both our parents were addicts and ended up dead before we were teenagers. I know how this goes. But my sister is refusing any kind of support from me (I’ve offered to take her to meetings, drs, just sit and have a cup of tea and a chat, everything).

It all came to a head earlier this year when I’d heard she was blind drunk the day after taking her new baby home and I decided to anonymously report her via crime stoppers. I felt awful but social services came over and by the sounds of it nothing was done.

She has since been out almost every weekend, keeps dropping the baby off at random peoples houses (according to my brother - she won’t let him have her because he’s so judgy she said), and last weekend ended up in a fight in front of her kids that led to a split lip and black eye.

Would IBU to keep reporting her? I know I’m not the only one that has but nothing seems to be happening. There must be a huge case spanning years, so why aren’t social protecting those children? And what can I do?

You need to fill in a MASH referral form it's direct to social service. School will also probably be reporting via this too.
I can't link as it's it specific to your county as it goes to your local social services.

That's debatable. Too often everyday neglect is accepted by services - until something catastrophic happens, then they have to act. Up til then, the files just get bigger and bigger as more reports are made, meetings are held etc. And I should add, thresholds vary across the country. They shouldn't, but some LAs are more likely to act more quickly than others.

I’m so sorry to hear this and it must be stressful for you! I would keep reporting to anyone and everyone who will listen, it sounds like she is in denial but from what you’ve described her situation sounds extreme and it’s very likely she’s also intoxicated while looking after the kids. I don’t know what else to advise but I do empathise with how worrying this must be for you. Honestly, I wish social services would do a surprise visit or something on her! X

Those poor children. It sounds like an awful situation for you all but please do keep reporting her. I don’t really know but it may help to use your name because then they can follow up on your reports and connect them. It’s hard for authorities to get children into safe care and make the right decision for them. It’s so hard for families too.

You absolutely should not feel unsafe in reporting her and that’s terrible that you have been made to. Nonetheless, those children are so vulnerable. I would suggest speaking to social services/school to see if they can advise you at all on reporting things as accurately, fully and safely as possible.

Those poor little children. What a life. Please do everything you can to get this sorted as they are far too young to look after themselves

She has already tried to do that,read the OP!

School will most defo see it as safeguarding and they will contact SS they won’t let it rest,so hopefully this will get sorted and those poor kids will be taken to safety.they have seen and heard enough and they are all so young.please don’t stop reporting.i hope everything gets sorted quickly as those kids cannot live like that.

Keep reporting this. Doesn't matter how many times you do it, these poor children are at risk. Something similar happened in my family. My s-in-l was a drinker. My db, her husband passed away due to cancer, but she had issues with drink long before he became ill. My parents would have the children nearly all the time because she was always drunk. It was 1.30am, a neighbour of my s-in-l rang my parents to say she woke up hearing children crying, they had been locked in the car, it was -3° that night, the car frozen up. My parents went straight away, my dad smashed the car window to get the kids out. She the s-in-l was crashed out drunk . My parents sorted the children out, they were freezing cold, & we do not know how they survived to be honest, l can still shed a tear 23yrs later. Very long story short, my parents rang the police and social services, who all came to the house within 20 minutes. My parents took the children to their house, where they remained until there careers took them away. The mother disappeared, she flew back to Australia, we found out through the police. All three children are amazing, so proud of them, and equally as proud of my parents. Please, do all you can, you will never forgive yourself if something bad happened

Report

Why are people repeating the same things that have been posted on the thread umpteen times already?

Some authorities don't have a paper referral for the public. School could fill one out if that's the case.

All local authorities have means for public to make referrals via the MASH

🙄

So much nonsense on this thread really.

Likely won't make a difference. They'll report to social work, who typically do nothing. It's heartbreaking

Schools have a system (in England) called CPOMs where they report incidents and can share directly with MAST (or however the OP’s sister’s front-line emergency team styles itself). The OP can also refer anonymously via the NSPCC. The NSPCC will triage and pass directly to the relevant LA. This is what my neighbour does when my multiply neurodivergent adoptive children kick off. I then get a call from a MAST worker, probably about five days later, to ‘anonymously’ relay the concerns. The MAST worker then closes the case. To be fair, I am still waiting for a call back from MAST from August 2025, when I phoned them for help when my AD1 was trying to batter down my bedroom door with her younger sister behind it. OP, I would strongly recommend that you phone the police force your sister lives in, particularly the domestic abuse team. You will get further with the police than you will with children’s social care. The police have special powers of protection for children so if they do a welfare visit and deem the children to be at significant risk of harm, then the children can be removed instantly.

Yes but in some people - members of the public- can only ring up.which means they don't get to see how their concerns are recorded. Or if they've been recorded.

Tell the social workers I work with who hold caseloads of 20-24 children, work all the hours, go to court to remove children and drive them across the country to new homes not getting in their own beds until 11pm, writing reports at weekends etc etc that they typically do nothing 🙄🤬

What difference does it make if they refer by phone or online form!?

If I want to get a message across and be sure I've done it I tend to put it in writing. Don't you?

They've offered help. How can you read that description and not think this family need outside help. People like you are part of the reason children get left in awful situations that either ruin their mental/physical health, or kill them.

The school will have already been contacted by the police and SS

Something is amiss here

My concern is the children who I am constantly referring to social work due to neglect but are left living like that because social work either won't take the case on to investigate or glance at it and discharge them. That wasn't a dig at social workers, that was a statement about the social work as a whole. The system is entirely broken and it's children who pay the price. Regardless of the hours worked or size of their caeload, it's ultimately children who are paying the price of an inept system that's under resourced and not fit for purpose.

We don't disagree in principle but please be careful about how you word things. We typically do an enormous amount.

Unfortunately, there is extremely little outside help. Social care has been decimated under 14 years of Conservative rule. There are nowhere near enough foster placements and nowhere near enough adoptive homes. Mainly because foster carers and adopters have wised up to the fact that there is no meaningful support from local authorities or the government to help them re-parent society’s most vulnerable children. It would be vanishingly unlikely for a foster home to be found to keep all four siblings together. Ditto an adoptive home. Only last month, a judge in the family courts division made a placement order for adoption for a family of four siblings to remain together while simultaneously accepting that is was highly probable that no home would be found. If the children were removed from their mother, children’s social care could look first to place them within the extended birth family. They will say that this will be a better outcome for the children. The truth is that this will save the LA hundreds of thousands of pounds each year. Kinship (family) carers are treated even worse than foster carers and adopters. Foster carers get paid a professional fee. Adopters generally do not. Kinship carers only get an allowance if they are in one of, I think, nine or 10, boroughs of a pilot scheme. Otherwise, kinship carers are overlooked and exploited as a free resource.

Seriously? So because she is a single mom to 4 kids she should be excused from being drunk, having the police around all the time and getting into fights? It’s the sister’s responsibility to rescue her or should the mother put her big girl pants on, step up and be an actual mother and get help for herself I’m a single mum with 5 kids and I don’t behave like that! Family support when someone has a blatant addiction is futile. Someone needs to think about the children who are suffering as a result of her behaviour!