I must agree with our fine Canadian neighbor Lisa: “When I first read this, I seriously thought it was a spoof on the welfare state, but like Billy Beck, I guess I haven’t been paying enough attention to what’s going on in Britain.” I love it when nanny state liberals are upfront honest.
The Nursery Rhyme Police: Parents could be forced to go to special classes to learn to sing their children nursery rhymes, a minister said. Those who fail to read stories or sing to their youngsters threaten their children's future and the state must put them right, Children's Minister Beverley Hughes said. Their children's well-being is at risk 'unless we act', she declared.
Mrs. Hughes condemned the way governments before 1997 thought they had no role in the upbringing of children, which it 'regarded as the entirely private arrangements families make.' She praised the Government's record of pouring billions into state benefits for single parents, into providing subsidies for childcare, into pushing mothers into work, and into the 'Sure Start' children's centres.
