Parenting: Cameron's childhood adviser says we're all getting it wrong. Is she right?

[HelenMumsnet]

Morning.

Claire Perry, MP, David Cameron's adviser on childhood, has been telling the papers today that Britain's parents have got it all wrong.

In The Times (£), the Telegraph and the Daily Mail, Perry is quoted as saying...

• We fill every moment of our children's lives with organised activities, "damaging their lives" by leaving them unable to fend for themselves when they go to university.

• We should 'snoop' on our children's text messages and internet exchanges. Perry says that, as a society, we are all 'complicit' in allowing a culture where youngsters can make inappropriate contact with strangers at all hours of the day and night. She adds, "Most parents are too busy, don't know the words, aren't aware their children are doing it. They are living in digital oblivion."

Do you agree with either of her points?

Or not?

Please do post and tell!

She gives that impression on Question Time (Claire Perry) that every thought she has is New and Important.

Yes, there is a tiny minority of middle class DC who are over scheduled and stressed.

Is this an issue which the government needs to worry itself? No it is not.

I suspect the group of parents she has spoken to ARE the upper middle classes who would raise these 2 issues.

Lazy, anecdotal nonsense designed to get the Tories' tame newspapers rattling on about parental (read maternal) inadequacy and how it is To Blame for everything. Thus ignoring the impact of consumerism, financial crisis and political and media hypocrisy to name just a few non-parental evils.

Like your analysis there dg

yep, good and succinct dg.

I saw her on question time too - very annoying woman with a very smug, annoying face... on the same show as Ken Loach who I would vote for had he chosen politics instead of film!

Tbh, Ken Loach got on my tits a bit as well during that QT.

Why can't politicians focus on helping bring up the bottom (ie children who are without) rather than pass comment on children who have parents who are trying to do the best for their children.

I would love to see all children, regardless of their parents ability to ferry them around/pay, be able to participate in at least one organized activity such as music lessons, sport or art outside of school.

My children age from 32 to 11 and todays' parents seem to spend no time with their children or allow them to learn through experience or risk taking. Children are either in their own rooms with TV/laptop or at an "activity". Both parents work far too long hours (earning money to buy laptops and TVs and 2/3 foreign holidays a year) and spend too little time with their kids. I play board games with my son and when his friends come round they love it, often never having played one! These children don't eat at a table, en famille, or walk to school with mates or read real books.We need to degadget our childrens lives and get talking to them and teach them responsibility and how to take risks.. like crossing the road, climbing trees, making dens and taking public transport, the everyday stuff that builds real life experience.
My neighbours 3 year old has a tablet and a phone and the TV is on all day on the one weekday when the child isn't in Nursery. I am appalled at what I see as benevolent and indulgent neglect. Of course he can change a TV channel but is in nappies (something all toddlers were out of 25-30 years ago by the age of 2!) and he has no formed speech. Modern children have not changed that much in the past couple of generations and technology doesn't replace chatting with Mum or Dad and learning from experience. If the Government can get people to reengage with the hard and vital job of being parents and stop them palming it off on third parties/technology.. good luck to them but I won't hold my breath!

Agree with that too Supermum - and there seem to be very few opportunities to take part in creative art workshops where we are. I wonder why that should be ? Looks like a gap in the market from what I've seen !

But completely agree that every child should have the opportunity to do something special and extra at least once a week. Brownies, Guides, and Beavers (at different stages) were good for us, but some places have a waiting list, and the timing of the groups (after school) and cost could be problems for some.

*Want2b"

I totally agree, it seems like what I thought was available to all is only offered in my area. Do any other LEA offer free lessons and activities? Surely there must be others, perhaps known as this area is for lots of unemployed, or places of lots of culture?

Jasmo.

I can see here that you are speaking from your own experiences, what you hear, see etc.
Not all parents are like you suggest though, on certain threads on Mnet it seems to be the norm, but they are hardly representative of the whole population.
I too have experienced the same and in rl have been termed abnormal for not doing the same. But I was never the conventional type anyway.

Curryeater.

If you are not having a foreign holiday and you have time for your dc you aren't the people Jasmo was talking about. You talk to your dc don't you?
Well there are some parents who are too busy or too lazy to do this and rely on technology rather than talk to their dc.
Jasmo isn't wrong, I have come across them too. They weren't just the ones working though, some were unemployed.

The trouble is it's all very well blaming parents for working too hard, but it is increasingly rare for families to survive on one wage. Not if one wishes to own a home, have children, help them through tertiary educaion and provide for retirement. Not unreasonable things!

Jasmo todays' parents seem to spend no time with their children or allow them to learn through experience or risk taking. Children are either in their own rooms with TV/laptop or at an "activity". Both parents work far too long hours (earning money to buy laptops and TVs and 2/3 foreign holidays a year) and spend too little time with their kids.

As sweeping generealisations go, this one really takes the .
How do you know the intimate details of other people's lives, ie. how much time they spend in their rooms/at an activity? And do you not see how offensive your assertion that parents work long hours for the sole purpose of having gadgets and holidays is?

Jasmo

Do you think it is like this now though because things have changed. You sound a bit older than me and I can remember when we first started out houses were a lot cheaper than now and it was a bit easier to survive on one income. It is nearly impossible now. Add this to the fact that full time jobs are not really the norm, many parents are both working part time jobs.

You are right though whether people like it or not the type you described do exist, as I said I too have seen this. Its not fair though to say this is typical of parents today as ime there are no typical parents.

"The trouble is it's all very well blaming parents for working too hard, but it is increasingly rare for families to survive on one wage. Not if one wishes to own a home, have children, help them through tertiary educaion and provide for retirement. Not unreasonable things!"

Indeed, and the cost of housing, of tertiary education and of retirement provision have gone through the roof in a generation - while tax rates have increased massively.

I run a guide unit in a very wealthy part of our city and my girls have got very over-organised lives with LOTS of after school sport, DofE, homework, guides, etc. But the parents will tell you that the girls are happy, they want to do each activity (even beg to) and it all helps them get into a good university these days. I give them as much leeway at guides to take decisions and risks and self-organise as I can but I am not NEARLY as worried about these slightly over-stimulated 14yr old girls as I am about the 14yr old girls in other parts of the city who are in the park on a friday night drinking buckfast and getting into all kinds of risky behaviour, or those who've never had an opportunity to explore their sport, art or academic potential and see no future beyond a NMW job.

That is absolutely true Bonsoir.

Our generation have much bigger outgoings than the last. And I suspect our own DC's outgoings will be worse still.

People talk as if lap tops and phones were fripperies, but can they really be described as such in this technological age. And is it such a sin to want to travel abroad? Indeed, in this global age isn't it important for our DC to experience how small a place the world is?

At the risk of needing my tin hat - I thought Jasmo had a good post - except that a lot of parents have to work just to pay bills, and not the foreign holiday. I was rather shocked on a recent thread that people wouldn't play simple board games because they didn't like them, or the DC made a fuss if they lost.

Absolutely agree badguider.

The future of these tiny number of kids with over organised lives doesn't look so bleak to me. So they work in law but play tennis and piano to a high standard. How shocking! So they work in politics but never iron and have a cleaner? Outrageous.

There are one million young people not in work, education or training. Isn't that where we're getting it wrong?

Agree exotic and yes I too agreed with Jasmo

I think the 'generalisations' about children being alone in rooms with laptops are not generalisations .... Not for secondary school aged children on particular

If you have two or three kids and any sort of existence yourself - how cs. You adequately supervise an evening on the laptop . Kids aren't dim

People were upset with snakes and ladders because you had a snake near the end and children got upset. I found that sort of thing very useful for teaching them that someone has to lose!
There was a very good article in the Times the day before about toxic childhoods and how the modern world is damaging our children and yet that has been ignored- it was far stronger than anything said by Claire Perry.