NOW CLOSED: Child aged 6-19? Please complete a survey - £2 to Railway Children (from Aviva) for each survey completed PLUS VIP rugby tickets to be won...

[AnnMumsnet]

We've been asked by the charity Railway Children to carry out a second Mumsnet survey, a year on from first launching our partnership with Railway Children & Aviva to raise awareness of the issue of children running away from home.

The survey should take a few minutes to complete and is open to all UK Mumsnetters with at least one child aged 6-19 years.

For every survey completed, £2 will be donated to Railway Children by Aviva, to support the work the charity does in the UK - please note you can only answer the survey once.

Everyone who takes part and adds their details at the end will also be entered into a prize draw to win VIP rugby tickets (for a family of 4) to attend the Aviva Premiership Final in May at Twickenham on 31st May 2014, courtesy of Aviva (these can be passed on to family or friends if you win but are unable to attend).

If you have more than one child aged 6 to 19, for this survey we'd like you to please answer thinking about just one of these children.

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw.

Here's the link again: www.surveymonkey.com/s/MNrailwaychildren13

MNHQ

[kinkyfuckery]

Done.

[EstoyAqui]

Done. I had no idea the number was so high :(

[AnnMumsnet]

thanks all - bump for evening crowd

[dahville]

I haven't completed it as my children are younger but wanted to raise the issue of step-children who live with you part-time; I would say most surveys don't account for this situation even though it is fairly commonplace.

[feetlikeahobbit]

Done was quite an eye opener

[musicposy]

Done.
However it doesn't account for children not in school (one home ed, one in work -it's still legal this year for 17- 19 year olds to be in full time work) so the only box you can tick is "I don't talk to the school/teacher" which gives entirely the wrong idea about the parent's level of involvement in their lives! There should be a not applicable box.

[JourneyToThePlacentaOfTheEarth]

Done. Some shocking stats in there.

[AnnMumsnet]

musicposy - fair point - have now added a line so folks skip that Q if their child is not in school. Do you want me to edit your response?

[cory]

One thing that occurred to me: the whole campaign is about telling children how dangerous it is to run away, it kind of seems to act on the assumption that as long as you don't run away everything will be fine.

What it doesn't do is offer any alternatives to a child who is in an untenable positiion: e.g. being sexually abused by a relative or brought up by an emotionally abusive parent.

[ZingWantsCake]

done

I struggled with the question of more help as in facilities for children who are thinking about running away (if I understood the question correctly! )

would it not be better to improve communication between parents and children, to get counselling?
to me it sounded like if there are places to run away to it will only encourage them do so - not the wanted result I presume?!

I had no idea about the number.
shocking

[LippyDiDooDah]

Done

[afromom]

Done

[Jux]

Done. Agree with cory.

[SacreBlue]

Done. Agree with Cory & Zing.

[BendyBusBuggy]

Done

[cariadmawr]

All done dh is gobsmacked amount of kids that run away

[looshkin]

Done, eye opening

[BrianTheMole]

Done.

[MaeMobley]

done

[Yas1]

Done. Very interesting

[mousebacon]

Done.

[YDdraigGoch]

Done

[PottyLotty]

Done. Not something I knew a lot about really considering how high the numbers are estimated to be.

[freakydeaky]

Done