17 year old who refused to go home

Mental health issues do put a different slant on things jingl. I suppose we just have to accept that we don't, and can't know the whole story so we can't really comment on what happened. I'm still not sure that criminalising the parents will help anyone, or do anything to heal family tensions.

I put DC on the plane at Heathrow, and sent them off to Germany, when they were 16 and 14. DD had travelled at 13 from Germany via Schipol. How mature your DC are depends on the way you bring them up. I raised my children to be independent and allowed then to travel to school, in the next city, from 11 years old.

This 'child' is old enough in UK law to marry and have his own children, therefore surely old enough to take responsibility for his actions, he is a young man not a child, he would not even be classed as an unaccompanied minor on the major airlines.
DS1 and 2 regularily travelled with DD 7 years younger than them, they were classed as responsible adults.
If the young man had committed a crime he would be old enough to be tried in an adult court, somewhere a line has to be drawn, the government decides how you bring up your children or you do.
Two DDs of friends have just returned from a trip to Mongolia to vist family friends, they are 15 and 17 and travelled quite happily by themselves.
When DD visited friends in Morroco at 15 Morrocan airlines classed her as an adult.

I wondered about a rep. I remember sitting on a bus waiting for a couple who had forgotten/overslept anyway they weren't at the meeting point and the rep went off to find them and bang on their door. Wondered if this family were travelling independently-if not didn't the holiday company have an obligation to make sure he was looked after? After all 17 year olds go on holiday by themselves don't they?

I want to know what was so wrong with his home life that he didn't want to return to it.

Some repoorts mention mental health issues.

The parents must have been confident that the boy would find the rep whom they had probably briefed already - on the airport bus - about the situation. Reps handle awkward customers - and their children - all the time.

Think I would have taken all his electronic toys (i-phone, kindle- whatever) and threatened to drop them one at a time in the swimming pool if he didn't get up. Whatever will life be like at home now?

And nothing to apologise for nightowl

It may well have been the final straw in a very long line of stroppy teenage tantrums. I'm sure one of us would have taken the other children home, while the other one stayed to resolve things. But we don't have all the facts so it's difficult to judge. I do think the penalty for the parents was unnecessarily harsh. He was 17, for heavens sake; our forbears would have laughed their socks off at the suggestion that this was a 'child' being abandoned!

Teenagers do need to know that although the law says they are adults in theory , many of them do not act as adults in fact. I do not know what I would have done as I can only theorise but I feel very sorry for the parents being saddled with a criminal record (and with him).

That puts a slightly different complexion on it Lona but I still feel it's not right to abandon your 17 year old in a foreign country. Family relationships obviously very very strained.

I understood that the teenager ran off and no one could find him, so as they had other children, the parents caught their flight.
I think I would have done the same.

Me too Indinana, except I'm too lazy to get up yet. Still lying in bed with a thumping headache, so apologies if I sounded grumpy

You are right, of coursr, nightowl. I was being flippant. Up early with a thumping headache

Having said that, I agree with stb that I couldn't have done that either.

But it's not silly teenage boy - 0 parents - 1 is it? Parents have now got a criminal record and worse still, for an offence against a child. This will stay with them for the rest of their lives, will have to be disclosed if they apply for jobs or voluntary work with children, could have serious implications for their care of their other children in the sense that this will have been referred to social services; the repercussions are frightening. Yet another case, similar to that of the young boy who sent a naked selfie, where the penalty appears extremely disproportionate on the basis of the information we have been given.

I am mixed over this.

On first look, I thought well done parents. They were following through because they were at the boarding gate apparently.

But they appear to have left him at the hotel, with no means to even find alternative accomodation in a different country.
I couldnt do that to a 17 year old or even adult, no matter how annoyed with that person I was. That is potentially dangerous.

I agree though, it may have played out differently in the UK.

I am trying, and failing, to imagine the alternative option: drag a big strapping lad out of bed and forcibly dress him? wrestle him onto the bus? literally fight back if he fights you off? The parents would then probably have been charged with assault
As it is, it's sulky teenager 0 : parents 1
Stupid boy!

When we were living in the Algarve, DS2 16, had arrived from school in the UK. There was a campsite with a disco opposite the complex we were on. DS2 was allowed to go over for an couple of hours before we closed up and went home. After about 3 weeks he decided to hide one night and stay later.
We had been working for 16 hours and wanted to go home, after a fruitless wait we told our night receptionist that he was there and he said fine he can sleep on one of the chairs in reception.
He actually fell asleep on one of the loungers round the pool, to be woken up by one of the groundsmen hosing down the loungers with very cold water,,, oh dear, he didn't notice him !!!!! he had of course been informed by the night guard that he was there.
The head receptionists Father was the local Chief of Police and found it hilarious. Needless to say DS2 was always on time to go home after that.
I wonder if the young man in the article had gone running to a Rep and they were covering their backs.

In all probability one of us (parents) would have sat in reception and waited for him while the other took the remaining kids home. It would have considerably altered the backing he would get in the future if he wanted help with university fees, etc.

It's another of those infuriating reports where we only get half the story. Hopefully the rest will be revealed.

Definitely a very silly and typically self-absorbed teenager having a tantrum. If absentdaughter had behaved that way, would I have left her behind? No, I wouldn't have done but I would have been very angry. If absentdaughter had been absentson, I don't think I would have left him behind either – but equally angry. Teenagers are a pain in the neck, as a general rule, but they are young, irresponsible and, as parents we still have a responsibility for them, even if they don't acknowledge it. Still a little bugger!

Bet they reckon it was worth a suspended jail sentence. I hope so! And I hope they continue to call his bluff.

I'm slightly surprised the 'authorities' found out before the rest of the family were safely home and having a refreshing cup of tea. I wonder if the silly boy went and cry-babied once they'd made it clear they meant it.

Toddle tantrum material in a seventeen year old.

He was 17! Most of us had been working for years at that age - since 14 part time for me, and full time from 16.

This was no 'child' - this was a sulky teenage, well old enough to know better, in a very bad mood, having a tantrum.

I feel for the parents.

You are right about the link -sorry!! But I am glad we had all seen the story!

I also can see how it happened. How come the faced prosecution? In the UK a child over 16 can choose where they live, (practically speaking its well nigh impossible to do) but I cannot see how anyone in the circumstances could have been prosecuted under British Law.

It should have been firmly discussed with the boy and his parent and "advice given". The lad was probably too pissed to bother to get up. I hope they made him pay his return fare.