school emailed round my car reg telling whole world i parked illegally

[verycrossandembarrassed]

is this okay for the school Headmistress to do this to me? they say i parked illegally this morning, took a photo of my car and have now emailed every single parent at my DS's school with all the information. nothing has been proved! i know i've probably annoyed a neighbour but is this fair how the Headmistress has acted? Surely I must have some rights too? It's just sooo embarrassing as I count lots of the mummies as my good friends. I don't think she should have been able to do this and would like to know my legal rights and complain about this treatment. Really awful for my DS too.

Didn't think we had a vigilante process of justice in this country

How on earth is it 'vigilante' to say you were completely wrong and that the Head has done nothing wrong?

If this is an effective way to stop people offending, and all the principal has time to do, then I think this is fine. You would also probably think it was fine it was your front drive.

Vigilante is if she cornered you after school with a gang of other parents and roughed you up.

If it's any consolation, OP, you have thrilled the slavering chops of Mumsnet! We like nothing better than drawing up in a circle round the fire to discuss the evil of inconsiderate school parking. In the many, many threads I have read on this subject, nobody has ever actually owned up to it! And here you come, into the circle of vipers, offering yourself up for sacrifice

I think it's a suck-it-up situation, I'm afraid.

Unless you were illegally parked on school grounds I don't see what business it is of the Heads how or where you were parked and I'd certainly complain to her .

She has no business distributing your car reg to all and sundry, with commentary, who made her the parking police?

MN a bit vindictive this morning, OP I think Head was v U to do what she did.

People are under a lot of pressure in the mornings, has she anything constructive or helpful to suggest about parking issues before she implemented a unilateral, without notice, name & shame policy?

Seems fairly outrageous to me.

i dont think it was ok for the head to do that. why not just speak the the parent/car driver one to one. that probably would have been enough and the op probably would not have done it again.. traffic wardens take pictures as proof. not to email to x amount of parents at a school. the head teacher is not a traffic warden.

anyway op not much you can do now its been done. it will soon pass.

God i wish our head teacher would do this!

Sorry op I have no sympathy, you are embarrassed well whoopee, inconsiderate parking near schools puts children in danger! If embarrassing parents helps to stop them parking like that's then I am all for it.

If I were you I would be sending an apologetic email and make sure never to do it again.

I'm guessing the HT doesn't know every parent's registration number hence the mass mailing.

Bloody hell, I wish my school would do this, I've emailed them a couple of times about completely twattish parking and asked them to text all parents but they won't!

Not sure what your beef is, OP - what the head has done is not illegal! You,. on the other hand, parked blocking someone's drive. Bet the poor householder is fed up to the back teeth of parents doing that.

If your school has resorted to this kind of tactic, it has almost certainly had long running regular problems with crappy parking that is upsetting the neighbours and causing the head to tear his/her hair out with the level of issues and complaints. Perhaps you've never parked badly there before but if everyone does it just only the once, that leads to daily drive blocking issues for residents.

I can certainly see how embarassing it must be, but that of course is the point of the exercise in providing a deterrant to others. Assuming what they said is accurate can't see what recourse you've got here.

Did the Headteacher previously warn parents that bad parking would be published? I would hope so as this may have been deterrent enough plus OP really wouldn't have a leg to stand on. If not, I think it's slightly unfair to target one instance in this way...

No the head or the school work t have time to speak to every parent that does this. If it's like our school they have sent out so many letters on the issue, it's the pta fb page etc and we have had the parking wardens come round etc but it is a total pita and it puts children's lives in danger. Park a bit further away and walk, get there earlier so you can park safely, whatever but it's not Ok to park inconsiderately and cause danger for the other children, I don't care how much of a rush you are in.
And I am pretty sure even if you are in a rush if you then caused an accident that heaven forbid killed a child you would wish you had parked safely and were late rather than endanger a child. And that is what it comes down to.

You've still not told us exactly how you were parked OP - Were you across someone's drive then?

You've been used as an example by the school to deter more people from parking in the way that you do/did. Yes it's embarrassing - That's the idea.

I bet there has been a warning in a previous newsletter that they might do this. You parked illegally and the head said you parked illegally. The head is telling the truth and hopefully you won't do it again. You could have stopped an ambulance getting to the people in that house.

A car registration number doesn't identify an individual, so it's not personal data.

There's nothing to stop anyone publishing a registration number.

Not much point in the head teacher speaking to individual parents really, because I would imagine the response will be, as some posters have said, 'what business is it of yours where I park?'.

Whereas the OP is now embarassed, so, well, job done, she probably won't do it again. I can see why headteachers resort to this - they are the ones who have angry residents on the phone when they can't get out of their drives, and angry parents on the phone when they have had difficulty getting safely to school due to other parents inconsiderate parking.

Everyone will have forgotten the number plate by half an hour later. They are prob sighing in relief that they didn't get nailed.

Forget about it.

Life would be so much easier for you if you held up your hands, apologised, then didn't do it again.

Instead, you're on mumsnet, spending so much more time banging on about embarrassment and your rights.

You got caught out being inconsiderate. Own it. Move on.

I wish our head would do this. Some parents deserve to be read the riot act.

I always take sneaky pics and bang them up on @yplac on twitter

"...with no consideration of the facts."
**
The fact is you parked your car illegally and the head took a photograph as proof. I think what you meant by the part of the sentence I've highlighted above is why didn't the head ask you about your reasons for parking the way you did before naming and shaming. The answer to that is simple; there is no justifiable reason (unless you'd been involved in a accident, which you obviously hadn't) for you to park across someone's drive, be it for five minutes or an hour, once or one hundred times.

Perhaps if you didn't want to be embarrassed you shouldn't have parked there. In your situation I would have parked further away and been late. You had alternative choices, you chose to be inconsiderate.

In future if you choose to be inconsiderate and park illegally then expect ramifications for your behaviour.

It looks like the Head's approach to dealing with this issue works....you are unlikely to do this again. It's a win win situation as far as I can see. I think barring a life or death situation there is no justification for blocking someone's driveway, they might be in just as much of a hurry as you and need to leave quickly.

And no, the head hasn't done anything remotely illegal. I. Fact, she could have taken a photograph of you getting into the car and emailed it, it still would have been perfectly legal. Unlike your actions

Hmmm, I think it's done its trick really so will say no more.....actually I will. Unless you live on the same road as a primary school (I did for 11 years), you have no idea how awful it is between 20 past 8 and 9.15 and then from about 2.45 onwards. The bad parking, double parking, parking in my driveway (yep) the tooting, the 4 year olds getting out of some huge 4x4 on the roadside, the mums who stand and chat/laugh brayingly for another 20 minutes after the bell has gone (still blocking my driveway), the fact we were basically confined to barracks as could not move down the road or out the driveway during this period. Add to that parents evenings, open days, end of term disco etc etc.
I do sympathise a little but do seriously wonder if such strong action hadn't been taken would you be so sure not to do it again?

My Gs's primary school regularly sends out letters asking people not to park within the school grounds on the small car park, but it is ignored. From September, the gates are closed on them for fifteen minutes and they have to sit and wait until the gates are re-opened by staff/governors.

At his previous school cones were put out to stop people parking on the zig zag lines and when I pointed out to a parent that she had pushed the cone out of place, she just backed up and ran over the cone crushing it with her four wheel drive. Parents also parked across the dropped pavement where the children crossed the road.

Sounds like the Head has had enough and I am aware of a local school that got into trouble on an Ofsted visit for failing to deal with this as it was labelled a safeguarding issue.