A tragedy that could have been avoided
I think that it is a tragedy that a 7 year old girl is killed on Boxing Day riding a quad bike that her father bought her as a Christmas present.
However, it was a tragedy that could have been avoided had the father acted as a responsible rather than as a irresponsible parent.
I don't know the details of how the road traffic collision occurred. However, it is reported that a woman driver of a Range Rover has been arrested for careless driving through drink or drugs.
I am somewhat puzzled why the father has not been arrested over the incident. He owns almost 50 acres of land upon which his daughter could have ridden her quad bike legally in relative safety. And yet, he chose to allow her to ride illegally upon the public highway. He has to take a large measure of responsibility for her death. Had this happened to the child if she was in the care of teachers on a school trip, then the teachers would have been charged with manslaughter.
A mixture of law, politics, autobiography and humour. Once described as "The Devilish Advocate" (Guardian), I do have the ability to provoke a response. Sometimes it comes from someone who uses a thought process, and sometimes from jerks usually associated with the knee.
I read this yesterday on the mail online, couldn't understand what the girl was doing on a main road. I suppose she thought it would be fun to get on the road, kids do daft things like that. It is impossible to wrap them in cotton wool all the time but I would not consider giving a machine like that to anyone under 10 years of age no matter where I lived.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was 11 I used to go visit a friend of mine on the Dagenham Heathway and we use to crawl through a gap in the fence and run up and down the bit of the District line which served that station. It was a wonder either of us were not electrocuted to death with the 600 volt current which runs through the centre rail. After that we also used to go into the railman's hut and light candles, upon which we sat detonators and occasionaly the odd BULLET which was left lying around in packets on the table inside. Come to think of it we could have been easily killed just fuckin' around in this environment.
ReplyDeleteThis digresses somewhat from the original argument insomuch that a parent cannot always have control over what their children do, and that is the point which I am trying to make. Sometimes accidents happen, unless you agree with the concept of the nanny state.