Children

I would nominate the media, children's fashion gurus, mobile phone companies, the internet, the Government, celebrity role models, etc, who see our children only as £ signs.

Strong parenting is the answer to this appalling situation.

Parents have submitted, not always willingly, to the very pressures that have turned their children into victims and, at the same time, anti-social and resentful fellow citizens.

Give childhood back to children and treat them as children, not as small adults.

They need guidance and boundaries, positive role models and an understanding of how they, as children, should behave in an adult world.

Children have been permitted to develop an alternative "culture" which resists adult interference and nobody has stopped them.

It is ironic that, at a time when so many people want the biggest 4x4, the widest TV screen, the loudest stereo and the most exotic holiday, so few are putting any real effort into the future of this society - our children. - D Brearley, Middlesbrough.

THE recent Unicef report regarding the wellbeing of children put the UK in a bad light (Echo, Feb 14).

A children's charity spokesman said it represented a "wake-up call". I wonder whether we can respond to the challenge?

Children need to feel secure and safe in the knowledge that their parents are there and care.

During a recent visit to Spain I was drawn to the attitudes that exist in relation to children. In many Mediterranean countries, family life is the focus. It is not about great material benefits.

Rich nations do not necessarily produce good parents.

Children are revered for what they are and not objects, who sometimes get in the way.

So often we hear and see children reprimanded because they simply exist, which raises the question: What is the motivation to have children and what are the expectations in being a parent?

There are examples of good parent role models within this country and this Government has in place Sure Start and family values has always been central to its thinking.

It is now about meeting the challenge if we can. - Bernie Walsh, Coxhoe, Durham.

WE may have created the worst place to bring up children in the developed world according to a Unicef report, but we lead the same world, including the US, by a short head in leaving them free to act almost entirely in their own interest.

I have hope. Good triumphs over bad eventually and human behaviour often goes round in circles.

As you lower discipline, standards fall. As standards fall, control slips. As control slips, society fragments. As society fragments, people feel isolated.

As people feel isolated, they only act for their own ends. As people act for their own ends, the weakest stratas in society are abandoned. As groups are abandoned violence and crime climb.

Eventually, and hopefully, the overwhelming voice of reason will be acted on because there will be no other option than to return to square one. - George Appleby, Clifton, York.