Child Care: Verboten!

I see Mr Brown has announced he's going to roll out some "free child care for poorer families". That might look good if it didn't come hot off the heels of the case of two women who've been forbidden from looking after each other's kids. So New Labour has criminalised normal activity on the one hand and then makes a promise for a crumb on the other, not a great bargain.

Why's the government got to be in charge of everything? These informal arrangements are the life blood of communities. When you have two working women (police officers in this case) who are helping each other out so they can do their shifts this should be seen as a sign of a healthy society where we look out for each other - but no - it's not just a problem it's illegal and has to stop.

It seems that to perform even these normal everyday tasks we're going to have to be government registered and approved. Ludicrous! We should be trying to improve the level of child care in this country not creating a crisis where no one is able to look after their friend's kids unless they've been rubber stamped by the state.

I don't just think this is stupid, it is the kind of thing that actively undermines community cohesion and is part of the philosophy that everything has a commercial value which must be subject to regulation and control. We should not need a legal document to be good to each other and a few more nursery places are not a substitute for living in decent, caring neighbourhoods.