I was new to the situation when this arose for me 4 years ago, having never been through it at the end of the day before with a parent who was obviously intoxicated. I did not feel comfortable releasing the child to their mother, so I told mum that the office wanted to have a quick word with her and asked her to come with me, as I was not sure what to do, and the only other colleague outside with me was a supply that day. I escorted the parent and child in to the office and went into talk to the Head to explain what my concerns were, it was then that she said we were not allowed to with hold the child unless we had a court order. We had to release her, and I had to file a child protection concern with the Head who was our child protection advisor. She called social services, and they said they were not able to show up as it was a first time "offence" of the parent showing up intoxicated, even though the family was well known to social services. They said they would log it, and keep it on file...what a joke was my reaction to that.
In answer to how would I feel if something happened to the child...absolutely disgusted.
In that year, 4 years ago, I was working in a VERY inner city school with children who had seen more in their 6 years of life than many see in an entire lifetime. I sent children home who I knew were being abused in all forms and ways and I could not do a damn thing about it, and it totally disgusted me that noone was there to help them. I did as much as I could, I reported their disclosures and their behaviours which made it blatantly obvious as to what was happening to them at home, as they knew things about grown up topics that no child of that age would have intimate details about unless they had experienced it for themselves. I had children whose parents were drug addicts, others who left their kids at home on their own whilst they went down to the pub for the evening, sometimes not coming home till the next morning, you name it, we had it in this school.
I did the best I could under the circumstances and tried to provide them with some security and reliability for when they were at school, but I was not their parent, and the social services register is SO chock a block full with cases, that sometimes some of these kids fall through the cracks of the system. It absolutely devastated me knowing I was sending these kids home to this at the end of each day, but as long as I saw them walk through my classroom door the next morning, I knew we had another day. Some of them, the abuse was so bad, that I did not know if I would see them the next day or not. Sending them home at the start of a holiday made my heart drop, as that meant a whole week or two at home being exposed to abuse. I honestly wanted to take them all home with me, but I learnt the hard way that you have to detach yourself from it, as difficult as that is, but otherwise your entire life is consumed by it, which is what ended up happening to me which is why I had to quit, and change to another school, as my family, and most of all me could not deal with it anymore. Sounds terrible I know, giving up on those kids, but when you see nothing being done about it from those that are there to supposedly be helping, it just beats you down.