How can you let your child reach 33 stone?
Dear Local Government Association,
Being a Conservative, I always err on the side of people taking responsibility for their lives. However, when it comes to the well-being of children, my attitude is that the children must be protected and if this means protecting them from their parents, so be it. On reading the news today that grossly overweight children may be taken into care, my first instinct of letting parents take responsibility for their children was quickly overriden by my strong belief that letting your child become seriously obese is neglect in its purest form, so I am right behind you 100%.
Your argument is that parents who allow their children to eat too much could be as guilty of neglect as those who did not feed their children at all, and to my mind this is an irrefutable argument. No doubt libertarians such as Devil’s Kitchen, The Appalling Strangeness and Question That will be up in arms about this, but this provides an excellent demonstration of where pure libertarianism falls apart. Even though I largely share their belief that governments should not get involved in people’s lives, parental neglect is a serious offence and a child’s life can be destroyed by their parents before it has even started. Anyone who suggests that social services should twiddle their thumbs while parents destroy the physical and mental health of the next generation is totally out of touch with reality.
To highlight the level of neglect we’re talking about here, this is not a matter of children putting on a few pounds or not doing much exercise. We are talking about children under 10 weighing 14 stone (89kg), a three-year-old weighing 10st, and only last week a 15-year-old girl in Wales was found weighing 33st. This disgraceful neglect by the parents puts children at high risk for diabetes and even heart disease before they’ve reached their 18th birthday. In fact, the 15-year-old girl that I just mentioned was told by her doctors that she could “drop dead at any moment”. It is worth keeping in mind that there have been only a few cases when social services had intervened in obesity cases, as you pointed out. Even so, I firmly support councils who take action or put obese children on “at risk” registers or take them into care. I also fully support your call for new guidelines to be drawn up to help social services deal with the issue, as it is a relatively recent phenomenon.
It is always strange when my genuine belief in personal responsibility must be put to one side, but social services is one area where government has a clearly definable role that is wholly focused on making society a better place. Libertarians can adhere to their principle of ‘all government interventions are bad’ if they want, but I’d prefer to adhere to the principle of taking care of vulnerable children.
Yours sincerely,
A.Tory
Witanagemot Blogs
“…only last week a 15-year-old girl in Wales was found weighing 33st.”
That was the one, IIRC, where the mother said she ‘wouldn’t drink normal milk when a baby’. So she gave her condensed milk instead…
I totally agree, and share your view that it’s a tragedy that parents can allow such things to happen in the first place.
Issues like this, and the environment, show the flaws in libertarian thinking indeed. They do have a point that government actions often don’t work and go wrong. But there comes a point where people can’t be left to their own devices, and that point is reached when they harm innocent people (which children by default are).
I would add that proper education for parents and children is the way forward. A child will eat until someone makes him stop, but by their teens they will wish they were fitter.
I myself am 13 stone, which is (just about) within the ideal range for my height, though I could do far more exercise. I’ve been on my bike for 2 consecutive days, which is the first time that has happened in a long time. A combination of working fanatically & bad weather.
What I really could do with is developing some muscle
Parental education is almost non-existent, and while I don’t think a top-down approach is the best answer it would be great to see the government discuss this with the third sector and fund whatever they think is the best way of helping parents.
Asquith, I’m sure that, like many Lib Dems, you could do with a bit more substance.
LOAT, are you perhaps overlooking the trade-off between quality of life and quantity of life?
I think in extreme cases such as the ones you pointed out, government, or state, can and should interfere. Granted, I am an American and not British, and I hail from the most liberal of all states – home of the Kennedy’s – Massachusetts, so any hope of commonwealth interference in the home’s of ignorant and/or neglectful parents is not likely to transpire.
Love the concept of your blog. Makes me think of Alan B’stard just a bit… obviously without you being a denizen of evil bit.
I will definitely have a read through your archives.
I have split with the Lib Dems over Europe. Though I share most of their views on domestic matters, & am certainly not a Tory/’kipper. ..
Additonally I have been drinking
Nice one, Mark. I can imagine a government initiative in the making.
Derigeur, glad I’m not a “denizen of evil” and I’m also delighted to hear a liberal thinker seeing sense on this particular issue.
Asquith, I’m not entirely sure the Lib Dems have any views on domestic matters. They have even fewer policies than the Conservatives, and that’s saying something!
Normally I agree with you, but I’m now getting a little wary. This is not my original thought (it is cheerfully stolen from a posting somewhere else) but someone wrote – ‘They came after the fox-hunters, then they came after the smokers, then they came after the fat kids, then they came after the???’
Ah ha, an interesting point. How far does this go, if one supports rescuing these neglected children? Allow me to deal with each of your examples in turn:
They came after the fox-hunters because HARM was being done to those animals. While I respect the fact that foxes can be a real problem, letting a pack of dogs tear them to pieces is not the solution.
They came after the smokers because their cigarettes were doing HARM to themselves and to the people around them.
They came after the fat kids because the parents were doing HARM to their children.
See a trend here? Libertarians are quite happy for people to inflict misery on other members of society. In fact, it is wholly against their principles to stop people causing harm in many circumstances.
In my opinion, government should leave decisions up to the individual – hence my furious opposition to the introduction of smoking licenses – but government has a legitimate case for becoming involved if people are harming each other (neglectful parents) or animals (fox hunting) or people are suffering (hence the existence of the welfare state, which despite all its failings is better than a pure libertarian’s preference for no welfare state at all).
I’m no authoritarian, believe me. This Labour government has exerted a shocking degree of control over not just our lives, but the decisions we make during the course of our daily existence. I believe that people should be left to make their own choices, but we must still accept that some decisions we make are unquestionably detrimental to society – at which point a government is entitled to intervene.
Of course, the way that they intervene continues to be a source of much debate but that’s for another day!
Oh for the record, I consider myself very middle of the road! I am more socially liberal but very fiscally conservative. I was raised in a militantly left wing house. I lived the with hypocrisy of countless (secretly violent) so-called peaceniks for far too long to have the liberal agenda pull the wool over my eyes. Being an Independent is a source of pride for me. I loathe the kind of political extremism which blinds either side of the coin to the cold hard facts due to an emotional response based on predetermined idealism. That’s why I examine each issue. I don’t claim to be perfectly subjective, I lean certain ways on the particulars, but I consider myself pretty well an independent.
“…government has a legitimate case for becoming involved if people are harming each other (neglectful parents) or animals (fox hunting)…”
The problem with your latter example is that the government’s ban on hunting hasn’t resulted in a diminution of harm to the fox. Quite the contrary. Now shooting, poison and snaring are the methods of destruction, all of which cause far more suffering than the quick kill of a foxhound pack.
It was never, ever about suffering. It was class hatred, pure and simple. The fact that most hunt followers were by no means ‘upper class’ was lost on the idiots of Nu Labour too, naturally…
You may be too young to be familiar with Alan B’stard. He *was* an evil Tory (would’ve been evil no matter what his politicial affiliation) in a 1980s/1990s satire show on the BBC or some British channel. It starred Rik Mayall. From The Young Ones (please tell me you know that show)! I had seen the young ones in repeats as a teen but discovered the alan b’stard tory program on you tube. I haven’t seen much of it yet but it is called by some acerbic, witty, sharp, brit satire on the political system of Thatcher 80s and Blair 90s. Oh, and Rik Mayall is kind of the sex, so, you know, I watched it.
Julia, you’re absolutely right. The fox hunting legislation was extremely poor and has achieved nothing, but hopefully you still get my principle.
Derigeur, I haven’t seen much of Mr B’stard although I’m well aware of who he is!
Ah good!
You have touched on a valid point which the libertarians do have, that intervention is often counterproductive. One thinks of the tax credits fiasco. And I think the excesses of government stem from the New Labour philosophy that they are uniquely righteous, and can therefore ratchet up state power, which will never be abused because the good guys are in control of us.
I don’t, however, think Mill’s dictum is very helpful. There are all kinds of unseen ways in which our behaviour impacts on others, and for the government to simply hold back 100% of the time will soon lead to the powerful and unscrupulous inflicting misery on us. A particular problem would be bad parents making their own children suffer and poisoning society thereby. But “the powerful and unscrupulous inflicting misery on us” is exactly what happens when we are overgoverned…
I think a truly liberal policy of decentralisation and empowering the average citizen, which opposes large concentrations of power of any (either?) kind, is the way forward.