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Tesco Thought Police Ban Mum From Buying Alcohol With Teen Daughter

by | 3rd, March 2009

KAREN Dumelow is 46. She looks younger. She at a branch of Tesco with her 14-yerar-lold daughter Emily. She is buying two bottle of wine (white).

The cashier asks for ID. Staff will not sell Mr Dumelow the wine unless her companion can prove she is of legal age to drink it. Can she work the pole? Tesco is tough on thought crime.

Karen Dumelow is by trade a fraud investigator. Emily does not retrieve a fake ID. No ID; no wine.

Says mum to the Porstmouth News:

“The checkout assistant asked Emily for ID and I just told her that obviously she didn’t have any because she is only 14 years old.”

Obviously.

“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was crazy. Do you have to leave your children at home if you want to buy alcohol now?”

Well, no. If you leave them alone, it might be against the law. Is there booze in the house in an unlocked cabinet? Best to get the booze delivered. And carry all prescription medication with you at all times. And lock your child in their room. No, don’t do that. There might be a fire, or worse, a step uncle or neighbour in high Gary Glitter paedo boots peeping through the upstairs window…

Emily is sent to the car. Yeah, with the car keys! Or was it already unlocked? Either way, for shame! Mrs Dumelow asks:

“I was paying for the shopping, not her, how extreme can something get? I would never purchase alcohol for an under-age person. The part that incensed me the most was that literally one minute later I bought the wine from the same till – it was unbelievable. All I had to do was send my daughter to the car and all of a sudden everything was OK.”

Says Tesco:

“We work hard to prevent under-age sales, including proxy sales where adults purchase alcohol for under-18s. However in this instance we got it wrong and sincerely apologise.”

The Mail is outraged. Elsewhere in the Mail:

This what the country has come to. In every walk of life there is a complete lack of common sense, let alone freedom. I spend a lot of time in the former USSR, and life is freer there! Believe it!
– Sandy

Word to Tesco staff… you don’t run the country.
– David, Essex,

No, the Mail does:

Brown launches undercover police Christmas blitz on underage drinking

‘Parents responsible for underage drinking’

Parents are to blame for under-age binge drinking and so are drunken stars, says pubs boss

Labour has created a ‘timebomb generation’ of teenagers hooked on casual sex, drugs and binge-drinking, claim Tories

Teachers told to spot children suffering a hangover

And:

Tesco bans parents from buying alcohol if they are with their OWN children

A Mail reader writes:

WONDERFUL! Good for you Tesco’s! Alcohol should not be sold together with other goods at all. It should be sold separately, in a separate, closed off unit. It’s called an “off licence.”

Or a park.

Trouble In Store & Supermarket



Posted: 3rd, March 2009 | In: Reviews Comments (6) | TrackBack | Permalink