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Crazy rules that are crippling childhoods
I KNOW we’re all more worried about our children than ever before.
Gone are the innocent days of my childhood when at weekends or during the holidays you would go out to play with your pals all day and only come home once you were tired or hungry.
Now many parents don’t want to let their kids out of their sight, and horror stories like the murder of little Sarah Payne back in 2000 and the disappearance of Madeleine McCann only reinforce that fear and unease.
Children cannot, however, be wrapped in cotton wool all the time, and they need to be able to play freely, even taking the odd risk.
Falling from a tree, tripping over while playing football or failing to jump over a burn and getting wet are all hazards of being a kid and part and parcel of growing up.
Of course we need to protect our kids and warn them of the dangers of talking to strangers, crossing the road in heavy traffic or climbing electricity pylons.
That’s only common sense, but the rules unearthed last week by those
who look after children in care are downright bonkers.
Jaw-dropping
These daft rules, exposed by Children’s Commissioner Kathleen Marshall, Scotland’s first dedicated child rights expert, really are
jaw-dropping.
For example, some carers maintain that children cannot be allowed out on their bikes unless they wear elbow pads, kneepads, helmet and have signed a risk assessment form stating exactly where they’re going to play.
In some care homes an adult has to be with them, too, and that adult must carry a first-aid kit at all times.
There have also been cases of children not able to go near a river unless they’re tied by a rope to a member of staff or even to a tree!
This is madness, but it’s all come about because the carers are terrified they’ll be held accountable for the safety of the children. They want to cover their backs and so have introduced these extreme rules.
Children are supposed to get scraped knees, bumps on the head and stung by nettles when growing up.
Obviously they shouldn’t be deliberately put in any danger, but you can’t take all the risk out of life.
They need to be free to fall off their bikes and skateboards, and I reckon a child will be far more damaged being tied to their teacher, or a sturdy oak tree, than getting a bit damp from falling in the burn.
We need to reverse this climate of fear and allow kids to be kids.
ON FRIDAY I helped to launch the Freedom From Fistula Foundation at Kinfauns Castle, near Perth, with former businesswoman of the year Ann
Gloag.
Ann has been helping women in Africa who suffer with obstetric fistulas for many years. She’s seen first hand what this condition can do to women through her work with Mercy Ships.
These poor women often go through childbirth alone. If there are medical problems and the labour is obstructed, the baby can die and cause the mother horrific injuries. Their baby is stillborn and they’re left doubly incontinent.
They’re frightened, ashamed and alone, as they’re often shunned by their community.
Fistulas can be repaired, but it’s a skill that needs to be taught to surgeons in the West. They have no experience of this type of surgery because fistulas seldom happen in Europe or in the USA.
Ann has been trying to break down barriers and raise money and awareness for women who suffer from fistulas.
Every penny raised for the foundation will go directly to the charity’s projects to provide surgeries, education and training.
Because fistula causes such horrible injuries it’s very difficult to get people to talk about it, even in this day and age.
I hope that will change. After all, just 20 years ago no-one talked about cancer in the media, and now we even have live breast and testicle
check-ups on daytime TV.
These poor women are someone’s daughter, sister, mother or aunt. They have no voice of their own as they suffer in silence.
It’s up to us to speak for them and to help them. For more info visit
www.freedomfromfistula.org.uk
EVIL JOSEF FRITZL has claimed he isn’t the monster everyone is making him out to be.
Despite locking his daughter Elisabeth in a cellar for 24 years, repeatedly raping her and forcing her to bear his seven children (one of whom died at birth and was allegedly thrown by him into the incinerator), he says he’s really
Mr Nice Guy.
His justification is that he didn’t kill his daughter and his children.
On the contrary, he claims he could have just left them all to die in that airless tomb, but he selflessly agreed for his daughter Kerstin to be taken to hospital. That, he thinks, makes him a compassionate father.
It was the hospital trip that exposed his whole vile lifestyle and he was arrested for his unspeakable crimes.
How can this sick, warped and pathetic excuse for a human being seriously try to suggest that he showed his victims mercy? He knew exactly what he was doing when he drugged Elisabeth and locked her in that cellar.
Perhaps he’s playing a clever game and trying to show the world that he’s deranged, but this bleating about being “compassionate” is distasteful and a further insult to the suffering he has inflicted on his family.
I HAVE no experience with drugs but I know there’s concern among parents and youth workers about the strong “skunk” cannabis flooding the market.
I’ve spoken to far too many broken-hearted mothers whose children’s lives have been ruined by mental health problems caused by this drug.
To me it makes sense to restore cannabis’s Class B status. The Government wants to send a clear message that they’re clamping down on the drug culture and want to act rather than risk the health of thousands of young people. They should have thought about that before downgrading it in the first place.
I don’t think reclassification will stop people experimenting and I still think patients with MS should get cannabis on the NHS if it relieves their symptoms, but I suppose it’s a baby step in the direction of tackling our out-of-control drug problem.
I KNEW Gina’s happiness in River City couldn’t last. She’s fallen in love with the gentleman that is Douglas, but it looks like Archie has regained his memory and has come back to haunt her. Once he
remembers Gina, his mum and her sister tried to kill him all hell will break loose.
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Lorraine
Kelly
