The one thing that typifies the pc/New Labour/Health&Safety/Tick-boxer mentality above all others is fear of the overwhelming mountain of empirical evidence which contradicts almost everything they suggest.
UK Social Care, for example, has been wedded to Parental Alienation Syndrome for some years now: it’s a convenient cod-diagnosis to bang up mothers who give them a hard time. The whole theory has been discredited since 2002 in the US, where its paedophile inventor topped himself around about that time.
Smacking is another one. In the last eighteen months, three separate European studies have shown that smacked children tend to be better adjusted socially, and more readily able to withstand the brickbats of real life at school and in the office.
Now comes an American study under the aegis of senior New York child psychiatrist Marjorie Gunnoe. She concludes: ‘Smacking bans are simply not consistent with data collected by ourselves and others over many years’.
Don’t hold your breath waiting for the Hatties to notice this.