HT says I should report this situation, it had honestly never occured to me...

[TheInnerSea]

I work in the school opposite my house.

In common with most schools, the parking situation is chaotic and often dangerous. Concerns have been raised again this week and we (the staff) were having a conversation about what can be done. As part of this I chipped in about a parent who regularly parks across my or my neighbour's drive to collect from the Infants (no prob for me, as I'm not going anywhere at 3pm, big problem for my neighbour as she has children at another school).

Anyway, I was kind of sympathising with this parent, as she has a younger child she leaves in the car, so naturally wants to park as close to the gate as possible. HT was horrified and told me it was my duty to report this to social services, as such a young child should never be left in a car, even if only for a few minutes.

So, WWYD? I genuinely don't know now if I should report, or if this is an over-reaction, due to a foul mood caused by parents and local residents continually complaining to the head about the (admittedly atrocious) parking.

SS is a bit an over reaction IMO - but then i regularly leave DS in car and pop into butcher/shop (but can always see him through shop window IYKWIM).

id sooner report to police for blocking driveway

I wouldn't dream of reporting that tbh. I presume the mother is only leaving for a short time and the child is settled and strapped in the car.
I used to do this yrs and yrs ago so will probably be pounced on as out of date .

No, good, that's what I thought.

Ewaczarlie, I'm not inclined to report for blocking the drive. My neighbour may feel differently, but it doesn't inconvenience me and at least it's safe to park there, unlike those who park on the zig-zags, pavement, corner of a side road, zebra crossing....

I wouldn't report it, and I'd have done the same with my DDs.

As long as the child's strapped in safely, I think that's fine - I leave my 4 yr old and 9 month old strapped in car while I pick my 6 year old up whenever the weather is bad (so most of time then!)

I think it's a judgement call the parent is entitled to make. Yes sure absolute best practice might be to take the child with you, and I believe a childminder or nanny would be obliged to do so. But absolute best practice doesn't account for the sheer faff of disturbing a possibly sleeping baby, dragging out from the warm car for five minutes then plugging it back in. She's balancing the risk of the car being stolen or driving in to against the risk of her walking to school and back.

One thing... ALWAYS take the keys with you. dnephew somehow or other got hold of the keys, locked himself in and hooted with joy as he watched his mummy go frantic and finally ring the AA.

My 2.9 yr old ds unstrapped himself from his car seat and undid his 10 month old brothers straps whilst I was standing speaking to someone beside the car. He opened the door and as I turned round the baby fell out of the car head first onto the road. I'm glad I hadn't left them there alone.

To be honest I think social services have enough serious stuff to be dealing with besides having someone report a mum for leaving her child for what I presume is 5 minutes. Think this is another example of the world gone too far the other way.

Is there away school can get some sort of traffic warden or pcso to pop down at school times to remind parents of safe parking?

I wouldn't do it, but I wouldn't report it either.