Kirstie Allsopp has come under fire for letting her son Oscar, 15, travel across Europe by train. Photo / Eamonn McCormack / WireImage
Kirstie Allsopp has come under fire for letting her son Oscar, 15, travel across Europe by train. Photo / Eamonn McCormack / WireImage
The TV presenter revealed her pride in her son Oscar’s jaunt - then social services panicked her by ringing her up to warn they “might come to your house”.
Kirstie Allsopp says she felt “sick” after being questioned by social services for allowing her 15-year-old son to go interrailing across Europe, it has been revealed.
A social worker contacted the TV presenter demanding to know what “safeguards” had been put in place when she allowed her youngest child, Oscar, to travel for three weeks on the continent.
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, her local council, reportedly opened a file on that case which could be left open “in case there was another referral and we needed to come to your house and look into this further”.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4′s Broadcasting House, she said: “I felt sick, to be honest, I felt absolutely sick.”
“I panicked quite badly in the first kind of hour and called all sorts of friends, and luckily, sweetly, a couple of them laughed, which actually brought me back down and made me realise that I had to see that this was absurd and it wasn’t something to worry about.
Kirstie Allsopp says she felt “sick” after being questioned by social services for allowing her 15-year-old son to go interrailing across Europe. Photo / Getty Images
‘There was real, real fear’
“But my initial thought was real, real fear and worry and a sense of shame.”
She continued: “His cohort have all turned 16. Like many kids who are at Reading or Leeds [festivals] ... or travelling in Europe, there are some who are a bit younger simply because of their cohort.”
“Confidence comes from trust and independence and from doing things by yourself.
“My son is capable. It was his idea, his plan, his savings. He came to me and said, ‘Can I do this?’, and I saw no reason for saying no.
“And when I mentioned that he’d done it, I wanted to be inspiring.”
The episode began last Monday when the Location, Location, Location presenter wrote on social media platform X of her pride in Oscar after he and his 16-year-old friend returned from a nine-stop trip by train around Europe.
On Wednesday, during an interview on the BBC programme Today, she claimed better healthcare and mobile phones meant travel was safer.
But at 12.40pm the following day, Allsopp reportedly received a text message from a social worker from “Kensington and Chelsea children [sic] services”, which stated: “I am wanting [sic] to have a conversation with you re a referral we have received in relation to your son.”
She said: “I immediately rang the number and said, ‘I cannot tell you how angry this makes me’.”
“I was very agitated. I said I could not be more upset. How on earth have you got time for this? How on earth have you got the resources? Where the hell did you get my telephone number?”
The social worker then asked the presenter what “safeguards you put in place for your son’s travel”.
She was later called by a second council official who insisted there would be “different views” on the decision to allow Oscar to go travelling, Allsopp told the Mail on Sunday.
Allsopp was told to contact the council’s data protection team when she asked for the file to be deleted.
She said: “For me, that was the sucker punch - the idea this file might continue existing.”
The TV presenter thought her son's trip to Europe would be inspiring. Photo / 123RF
‘It was Orwellian’
“What [the official] said to me was, ‘If in six months there was another referral and we needed to come to your house and look into this further, it would be important that we had kept a note of the first referral’.
“That was the Orwellian moment. The fact it was maliciously done wasn’t coming home to her.”
“I felt sick. Then I was cross. I was very, very cross. It was just so extraordinary. I was in a parallel universe where they were actually taking this seriously.
“I have broken no law, and nothing about allowing my child to travel around Europe is neglectful.”
Oscar added: “When Mum let me go interrailing, she was probably like, ‘I’m giving him a great experience, he’ll enjoy it’.”
“Then to get called and have someone claim you were neglecting your child is pretty disgraceful and must be horrible to hear.”
‘Nanny state gone mad’
Alec Shelbrooke, a Tory MP and former minister, told the paper: “This is the nanny state gone mad. Any parent thinking of allowing their teenagers to travel will be terrified by this Orwellian development.”
“Surely, these council officials must have better things to do than intimidate a mother who knows best how she can trust her son?”
Fellow MP Dame Karen Bradley added: “It seems like the worst kind of box-ticking and a waste of effort and time by council officials who should be focused on children who are at genuine risk.”
A Kensington and Chelsea council spokesman told the Mail on Sunday: “Safeguarding children is an absolute priority. We take any referral we receive very seriously and we have a statutory responsibility for children under 18 years of age.”
