Brace yourself: your au pair may not like your housekeeping, putting it on par with a Richard Billingham photograph. That's one of the messages from a Sunday Time piece today about a new book called Au Pair (subscription), a look at the experiences of 50 Slovakian au pairs, the nationality that makes up the largest part of au pairs in Britain. Frankly they are horrified at the lives of the middle-class parents they work for, the article says.
The article cites cases of au pairs required to comb the stripes on the carpet, of employers being mean with the food provisions. And to be sure, true mistreatment is wrong, especially as it takes advantage of what are often young women in a strange country far from family and friends, often coping with a language barrier. A couple of years ago The Telegraph wrote about actual abuse suffered by au pairs.
Yet having had several au pairs who have ranged from terrific to terrible, many of the complaints from the quoted au pairs sound to me more like roommate criticisms. Those annoying parents serve heavy meals too late at night! I can hear them having sex! They don't keep house properly!
These are the issues of a young person who has never before lived with strangers, rather than employee grievances.
Of course, your au pair doesn't have the same amount of power as a roommate of equal standing. Families need to encourage shy young women to voice their needs and concerns.
Yet I'm fascinated by the self-flaggelation accompanied by criticisms levelled at middle-class parents from young, childless strangers from a different culture. Parenting culture, adult responsibilities and cultural expectations vary. I'm sure our au pairs think I am a terrible housekeeper. That's because I am. I want the tableaux of a domestic goddess but when I have a spare hour at home I'd rather play a game with my daughter or read a book than clean the bathtub. That's why I have a cleaner once a week. But I'm an adult who has made that choice. If the au pair doesn't like it, she can find a family more in line with her expectations.
Everyone who uses domestic help has a responsibility to pay fair wages and clearly outline the employees responsibilities. Au pair and nanny agencies need to protect their placements. And au pairs themselves need to be assertive about their rights.
Beyond that, we should all agree: they keep their personal opinions about our parenting decisions private, just as I'll keep private my opinion about their music and strange dietary requirements. It's all part of getting along.
Sounds like an Eastern European version of “The Help”. There are many dynamics of the help relationship and yes tolerance would go a long way.
I had six au pairs when my older two were little, and it’s so stringent hear that the only one subject to any kind of abuse was me! Four of them were fab, one was an arrogant so and so that I wouldn’t tolerate now that I’m in my 40’s, and the final one was a girl who should never have been recruited to the program so ill-prepared was she to be away from home. I couldn’t even leave her in the house with my children as she was on the phone all the time and not even in the same room as they were. (She lasted two months, BTW.)
The problems arise when the au pairs view the arrangement as a chance to live abroad and forget it’s also a job. In addition, when the parents view the au pair as nanny, chief cook and bottle washer it also leads to complaints.
For anyone thinking about having an au pair, it’s a lot of give and take and sometimes like having an extra child.
I have strong feeling on this subject. I agree that there needs to be give and take on both sides and that, at times, things go wrong because partnerships of any kind, particularly those that are based in the home, just do for any number of reasons. That’s life.
What infuriates me about au pairs is not the au pairs themselves, but the way that some families use them as cheap labour or – worse – primary childcarers. I used to work in the City and met an alarming number of people who could afford proper childcare, but begrudged the costs involved. Hence they went down the au pair route. Not only is this unfair to the au pair, but to the kids. Actually, let’s go further than that. It’s irresponsible.
And yet all too often these offenders were the first in the queue when it came to exercising their rights as an employee.
I’ve never employed an au pair. (My circumstances always dictated the need for a nanny. An eye-watering cost that I always met.) I know lots of people who have, though. The happy stories are those who use them as they were intended and not as slave labour.
Vent over!
My friend employed an au pair when, having split from her husband, she struggled to keep on top of the housework, a job and three small children. The au pair seemingly had no complaints but she obviously found need to seek comfort elsewhere, as she ended up in the arms of my friend’s (not yet ex) husband. Certainly put me off the idea of home help.
@A Modern Mother – As you say, tolerance is key!
@Expat Mum – We had a very nice au pair who I think was deeply depressed to be away from home. In the end she left just as we were about to suggest she go.
@Alison Spence – It was important to me when my daughter was young that we pay our nanny-share nanny a fair wage. It was sooo expensive though (including all the taxes). I agree that people shouldn’t expect au pairs to be full-time nannies and housekeepers. Even when you consider after-school playtime, you have to ask yourself: “Could this person handle something unusual like a medical emergency?” We need to remember that au pairs are “help” not experts.
@The Contented? Maybe – You do hear about these kind of stories from time to time. So icky, the idea of sleeping with what amounts to the babysitter.