Newbie swimming pool question

[GillP]

Good Morning,

My first post on here, please be gentle!

I've just returned from a lovely week in a Gite near St Emilion which had an outdoor pool. This pool was not fenced off at all. It is my understanding of what I have read that it is against the law to have a pool that is unfenced and therefore incredibly unsafe.

Luckily my children are able swimmers but I would like to know how I go about reporting this to the French authorities to potentially avoid a tragedy happening. We did speak to the neighbours while we were there but they said the owner wasn't particularly bothered about it!

 

Anyone help me please?

Thanks

[Kong]

It is not true that a pool needs to be fenced off. But a pool must have one of a number of security devices, of which a fence is one. These include covers of various sorts and pool alarms.

Someone else may advise to whom you might make a complaint.

Kong

[GillP]

Thank you. The pool has absolutley no safety devices at all, no cover, no alarm or anything.

I'm really worried about a child having a terrible accident so really want to get this reported!

Cheers

[Patf]

Perhaps you should warn the owner of the gite first that he/ she is risking others' lives?

[dave21478]

Exactly. A quiet word with the people concerned first, before you go ruining their livelihood.

[Val_2]

Did you book through a holiday lettings company etc? If so and no response from the owner direct to you, contact them as its in their interest too. Would hate to be the owner if someone drowns as they would carry the can especially if no panels warning that swimmers are at their own risk etc. If someone lets a gite with pool to strangers and can't be bothered to make it safe, they don't deserve to take people's money in the first place, its too late after the event!

[Théière]

[quote user="dave21478"]Exactly. A quiet word with the people concerned first, before you go ruining their livelihood.[/quote]

Whilst I do agree in principle that this is a serious breach of the many many rules we all live by I was surprised that after such a nice holiday in a gite that the next step is join various forums and begin a discussion without first contacting the owner (if it's that serious) to date you have only spoken to the neighbour who most likely doesn't care what the owner does and much less knows what the owner thinks or may have planned.

Being this is your first post here, but not elsewhere I actually wonder if you work for Du Toit pool fencing or another provider and are just seeking to get people talking as there is a bit of a recession on and times are getting hard. 

[Araucaria]

On another forum the OP says that s/he spoke to the owners, and they weren't interested.

My own contribution to all this is that very few young children get drowned, and those that do are usually below the age of 24 months: at that age they should be with their parents all the time.