URGENT Mumsnet needs your opinions for Radio 5 slot tomorrow (sunday) morning

[Carrie (mumsnet)]

Hi there

Just had a call from radio 5 who want us to go on and talk (briefly) about Maragaret Hodges proposals for parents. Main focus of chat is givt saying they will give written guidelines to parents on parenting. Is this a good idea? Would it work? Would you take any notice of it?

Any thoughts anyone.

Need your input before 9.30am tomorrow

Thanks as ever

Finished frothing at the mouth about Margaret Hodge, I think Cardigan has put it very well - government is about creating structures, tax regimes, employment laws, etc., which enable people to parent well.

And also agree about universalising any parenting courses, and making them a normal part of the pregnancy/ maternity experience, like syphilis testing now is and AIDS testing is on its way to being. But for that, you'd need to change the employment laws.

I don't think 'written guidelines' are going to reach a large proportion of the population. I read everything I could lay my hands on about pregnancy and parenting ... not sure it helped much

But round here many people don't even read the most brief and basic, but important, letters home from school. I just can't see the material being read.

It would be far more worthwhile to put the money into parenting courses. I do like the idea of 'obligatory' courses: but maybe not policed too strictly. If they are set up as being routine, then it takes away any stigma. When our church has run parenting courses in the past, people tend to think;
a) The person running it thinks they know everything and wants to tell everyone else what to do, and
b) The people who go must have some big problems with their kids

Whereas in reality all parents can help each other by exchanging info - like we do on here - and everyone IMO can benefit from parenting courses, at different stages ... not just for mothers of first newborns (when you're shattered and can't think straight), but for parents of toddlers, coping with starting school, what happens when the hormones kick in with teenagers ... eek! I'm dreading that one!

the only people likely to read written guidelines given to parents are the people who are probably least likely to need help on parenting issues as they will no doubt read voraciously all other matters about issues they are concerned about

its all a whitewash and media spin to get mileage out of doing so little for those families who sincerely need help .. over-burdened social care system / sadly under-funded NHS system

do they really think voters swallow such bollocks?

and any written information would need, by the very nature of the wide ranging audience it will be aimed at, to be so generalised as to make it virtually useless

(no doubt it will be extremely politically correct too)

and Margaret Hodges is a witch too and should not be in office (don't suppose this point is particularly helpful)

oh and another thing .. after the disgustingly cack-handed way this government has handled a number of issues .. eg the MMR debacle which I personally think got so bad out of a refusal to offer choice on the NHS (sincerely believe the furore would have died down and we would probably have herd immunity if choice was offered with a recommendation to MMR rather than MMR or the highway) ... any information published by this government would have minimal credibility in a number of camps

Another thing i think is that, the 'so called' experts so often get it wrong.
We all parent differetly and thus bring up different and individual children.
I wouldn't read it TBH, (well i'd flick out of curiosity), as i know best how to bring up MY child.

Go for it twiglett !!

parents who need help parenting should have personal, well-trained and informed support .. they should be identified at the earliest stage and helped

they should leave the rest of us alone to raise a generation of voters who hopefully will get a more trustworthy govt

But who will decide who needs help? Who is going to do the identifying? Sensible practical universal child development education would actually benefit loads of parents, not just those who "need help".

No!! - keeping going twlet

agree with JanH that support/literature/materials should be universal - that if there was no stigma to it, it would reach a wider audience

agree with JanH that support/literature/materials should be universal - that if there was no stigma to it, it would reach a wider audience

We all need help.

Whether the government is the best source of it is a moot point.

I also think it's quite dangerous - fashions change, but if a government has nailed its colours to the mast on one particular fashion, I can imagine it becoming something they won't let go of in case they lose credibility - can you imagine if 100 years ago, governments had given advice, and the Tory Party had had to reluctantly admit in the nineteen sixties that putting 2 month old babies on potties was perhaps not the best potty training technique after all? Same with solids guidelines - once governments start becoming associated politically with childrearing fashions, those fashions stand more chance of becoming ensconsed and harder to change.

Jan you are right "Sensible practical universal child development education would actually benefit loads of parents, not just those who "need help" --- but I could surmise that a number of those who "need help" may not read the book because they are caught in the trap of "needing help"

I am just saying that I would imagine the thousands / hundreds of thousands / millions (dependent on ad spend put behind it) spent on this kind of flannelling proposal could more usefully be put into the social care system to improve things at grass roots level

and as a very funny friend of mine said the other day

"if there was only one way of doing it, there wouldn't be so many bloody child-care books on the shelves now would there?"

Well, I'm a secondary school teacher, and sometimes, when I listen to pupils yelping, screaming, shouting, banging on walls, banging on lockers, and get jostled by them in the corridors as they move from one lesson to another, or when they bridle continuously against the most basic of instructions, I wonder whether they have ever been parented at all, or whether they have grown up in some colony of wild animals somewhere.
And I teach in a "very good" school.

Sometimes I think people forget that parenting extends beyond the age of 5.

Vote for Twiglett (and Marina/Caligula et al)!

How dare M Hodge presume she knows best? I'm the expert when it comes to bringing up my children - not some State Nanny. I don't doubt there are parents who need guidance but a booklet isn't going to solve that.

Agree PN - & what about the parents to parent the parents

Fabulous ... just googled Margaret Hodge

this is a snippet on our minister for Children from Sept 2004 organicfood.co.uk

"Children's Minister, Margaret Hodge has contradicted the Government's tough stance against childhood obesity by including a competition corner on her constituency report where the winner receives a book of vouchers for McDonald's...."

haha twiglett.

I also agree with PN .. but how do you bring back respect in a society where respect seems to be a dirty word