[West Ender]

Some years ago my eldest daughter saw 2 little boys aged about 6, from a nearby estate, throwing bottles into the road near her house and smashing them. She went out and gave them a good telling off and sent them home. Ten minutes later the mother of one of them knocked on her door and, when she answered, poured out a stream of obscenities at her for having shouted at her child. When my daughter told the woman what the kids had been doing she shouted that it was none of my daughter's effing business and she'd effing knock her effing teeth down her effing throat if she ever effing shouted at him again. What's the betting those kids, who will now be about 18, are now fully fledged vandals/criminals?

So I'm an old reactionary but I am nostalgic for the days when, if a teacher, policeman or neighbour gave a badly behaved kid a "thick ear", the kid didn't dare tell Dad because he'd get another one. Brutal? Hmmm. Hard? Possibly. Most of us, however, grew up to be decent citizens. God help the next generation.