The report says children’s lives are “more difficult than in the past”

The aggressive pursuit of personal success by adults is now the greatest threat to British children, a major independent report on childhood says.

It calls for a sea-change in social attitudes and policies to counter the damage done to children by society.

Family break-up, unprincipled advertising, too much competition in education and income inequality are mentioned as big contributing factors.

A panel of independent experts carried out the study over three years.

The report, called The Good Childhood Inquiry and commissioned by the Children’s Society, concludes that children’s lives in Britain have become “more difficult than in the past”, adding that “more young people are anxious and troubled”.

According to the panel, “excessive individualism” is to blame for many of the problems children face and needs to be replaced by a value system where people seek satisfaction more from helping others rather than pursuing private advantage.

A spokesman for the Department for Children Schools and Families said: “We know there are still risks and challenges ahead for children and parents and that there is more for us all to do”.

‘Tone deaf’

The inquiry has a long list of recommendations including:

• abolishing Sats tests and league tables in English schools

• a ban on all advertising aimed at the under 12s and no TV commercials for alcohol or unhealthy food before the 9pm watershed

• stopping building on any open space where children play

• a high-quality youth centre for every 5,000 young people

“Individual freedom and self-determination bring many blessings,” writes the report’s principal author, Labour peer Lord Richard Layard.

“But in Britain… the balance has tilted too far,” he says.

Another contributor, the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, suggests society has become “tone-deaf to the real requirements of children… in a climate where the mixture of sentimentalism and panic makes discussion of children’s issues so difficult”.

The panel, made up of 11 experts including eight university professors, says its conclusions are evidence based.

But some of its findings on family life in Britain are bound to be controversial.

Working mothers

It cites research suggesting that three times as many three year olds living with lone parents or a step-parent have behavioural problems compared with those living with married parents.

Children with separate, single or step parents are 50% more likely to fail at school, have low esteem, be unpopular with other children and have behavioural difficulties, anxiety or depression,” it argues.

“Child-rearing is one of the most challenging tasks in life and ideally it requires two people,” the report concludes.

It also suggests that having many more working mothers has contributed to the damage done to children.

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BBC NEWS | UK | Education | Selfish adults ‘damage childhood’.

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Davos town: not the most accessible venue Photo: Reuters

Preparing for the World Economic Forum – aka Davos – is such a stress. Not for me, but for my wonderful colleague Jane who spends weeks fixing, and then re-fixing, meetings so I can get the most out of it.

The beauty of Davos is that one can meet large numbers of the world’s most important/interesting/powerful/egotistical people in the space of four days. Interviews that would otherwise take months to arrange, and hours to travel to, take place in a small Swiss ski resort. It’s a journalist’s dream – and a PA’s nightmare.

* It being a ski resort, Davos is not the easiest place to get to. The flight to Zurich is fine, but then you have a choice – a train journey during which you have to change twice, or a two-and-a-half hour car journey with cartoonish icy mountain road bits thrown in free at the end. I plumped for a car this year, and used the time to start “tweeting” (ie micro-blogging on twitter). With no more than 140 characters to put in your email-cum-blog, it takes a while to get used to.

An innocent attempt to pass on a story about how Lord Levene (chairman of Lloyds of London) was impressed with the Davos hospital – after slipping and whacking his head on a ski – backfired. I ran out of characters and had to split the message in two, giving the impression that I had been pleased that the noble Lord had taken a tumble. I can only hope he dismisses it as a twitter schoolboy error on my part. And quite how interesting “traffic in Davos is bloomin’ awful. Worse than London/Atlanta” is to people, I’m not sure. But there is something quite compelling about it – I can see why Stephen Fry has become an addict.

* Americans have dominated Davos in all the years I have been attending. But they are nowhere to be seen, enabling the Chinese and Russians to flex their muscles. Chinese premier Wen Jiabao was a big hit with the business and media crowd at Wednesday’s private session. Knowledgeable and confident, he hit most of the right notes – including references to his recent re-reading of the work of Adam Smith. Warm applause from an audience including Henry Kravis of private equity house KKR, Sir Martin Sorrell of media conglomerate WPP, BP’s Tony Hayward, and Stephen Green of HSBC.

Davos is all a twitter with Wen and Vlad – Telegraph.

When Will Europe Be Ready to Chose a Leader Like Barack Obama?

As Barack Obama is sworn in as the first black president of the United States, Europeans wonder when — no make that if — they will ever see their own “Obama” in Europe.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama waves to spectators as he leaves his hotel in…

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama waves to spectators as he leaves his hotel in Berlin July 25, 2008. As Barack Obama is sworn in as the first black president of the United States, Europeans wonder when — no make that if — they will ever see their own “Obama” in Europe.

(Markus Schreiber/AP Photo)
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Could a second-generation immigrant with roots in the black Third World be elected prime minister or president in Europe?

My American friends find it difficult to imagine an immigrant overcoming Europe’s white-dominated, slow and elitist political systems anytime soon.

“Does anyone really think that Britain would chose a second-generation Pakistani as its leader?” Yale professor and intellectual heavyweight Harold Bloom said.

“Would Germany choose a child of Turkish immigrants? Or France someone whose parents emigrated from Algeria?”

But European friends and intellectuals also seem more optimistic, even if most statistics say otherwise.

Raj, a teacher of postcolonial literature whose Indian parents moved to Great Britain in the 1960s, said he could envision a European Obama in the next 10 years. Particularly in Britain, which had a Jewish prime minister in the 19th century, and is perhaps seen as one of the better-integrated European countries.

ABC News: Is Europe Ready for a Barack Obama?.