Au Pair Issues - Asked Her To Leave

[TheRoadToOmaha]

First time I've posted here. We hired our first au pair just after Xmas last year to look after our 4yr old son and 3yr old daughter while I work from home. In the time she's been here my son's behaviour has deteriorated which we initially put down to being in lockdown and him feeling unsettled having someone new living with us but he hadn't been himself for a while. We've noticed she favours our daughter and gives her much more attention. She is very impatient with our son and treats them both like an inconvenience. Our son has become withdrawn with everyone to the point that family and our childminder have noticed.

I heard her telling him off recently in French (her native tongue) and frustrated and crying ge asked why to which responded because I don't want to swear at you in English. Also, this morning he had marks on his arm after she got him dressed. He said it was sore but didn't want to tell us what happened. When I got him ready for bed it had turned into bruises that look like fingerprints. He didn't want to tell me what had happened but eventually admitted it was the au pair. I think he was scared to tell me.
We sat down and asked her about it, she said it was an accident and that her ring left the marks and that she didn't grab him. I pointed out that even if that were the case she must have been really rough with him to leave bruises like that. She basically just agreed with everything I said with no explanation or apology. Just feel awful to have experienced this and never imagined this would happen. No flights back to France and I don't think I can really recommend her to another family. I really don't feel comfortable with her being around the kids so really hoping the agency have a solution. :( Sorry mainly just needed to vent and wondered if anyone else had had a bad experience.

@Anotherlovelybitofsquirrel

If you don't call the Police and she goes on to hurt other children, they'll be no record of her assaults and she'll be free to hurt other children . Report her to the police for goodness sake.

The children involved are not obliged to put up with a traumatising investigation for the sake of other children. And OP’s concern must, first and foremost, be for her own children, not other people’s. If we want people to report crime for the public’s sake we need to be campaigning to ensure victim experience is reasonable and support is provided to counteract the damaging impact of the way our criminal justice system and social services treat victims and their families (some of which is necessary to ensure things are investigated properly).

@idontlikealdi

An au pair is for additional childcare not full time childcare while you hold down a job.

Not condoning her at all, I'd haver on the first plane out but you are in a remote location in a lockdown and want a teenager to parent your child?

Where in any of my messages did I say she was used as full-time childcare or to parent my kids? I'm a full-time student working from home. She was never over worked, and given additional holidays in fact. She didn't have to prepare any meals, bath or put them to bed, in fact I took over getting them dressed in the morning because my kids hated her doing it do much so literally all she had to do was entertain them from 2pm-5 30pm.

I agree @grandpacificpineapole it is a police matter. If she gets away with this then she may get another job giving her access to children. This needs to be prevented. I would tell the agency that she is their responsibility now & they need to deal with any of the logistics of getting her home or housing her until that is possible. It really shouldn't be your problem anymore.

@BoomBoomsCousin

It wouldn't need to come to that. The police aren't going to interrogate two children that age , don't be so ridiculous. The police should be made aware to prevent her working with children.

[quote Anotherlovelybitofsquirrel]@BoomBoomsCousin

It wouldn't need to come to that. The police aren't going to interrogate two children that age , don't be so ridiculous. The police should be made aware to prevent her working with children. [/quote]
The police will need to decide if they will pursue prosecution, which would involve questioning the children and they will need to report to social services, which can open up the children and OP to a huge amount of stress. While I understand why people want to see the au pair reported to the police, and I like to think I would do so in OP’s position, she is not responsible for protecting the rest of us and she doesn’t have to do so.

Yeh that is exactly my worry. The agent in Scotland has already agreed that she isn't capable of looking after children and is refusing to place her with another family. I've also private messaged numerous au pair Facebook group administrators to make them aware in case she tries to look for a family privately. She is now staying with the agent who is trying to organise flights for her to get back to France as we speak. I suspect she knows she shouldn't look after kids, I don't believe anything she did was sinister (no excuse for it).

I'm not naive to the legal systems way of dealing with things and wouldn't make a decision like this lightly. If my son tells me more has happened then obviously thats a different story but at the moment, I think the stress of medical checks, questions by strangers etc will be more traumatic for him.

I hope you got this sorted OP.

Even if the OP had called the police I have no idea how they would investigate it with the au pair back in France, especially now, after Brexit. As I understand it, it is much trickier (I could be wrong.) They probably wouldn't have bothered.

Did she manage to get settlement OP? I'm guessing she did. I wonder if this means she can come back to the UK?

Tricky but I bet you the police wouldn't have done much. A UK based nanny likely to try to seek employment again- different story, you'd hope.