Letter from the Family and Parenting Institute (FPI)

As a group of academics and professionals we are alarmed that Channel 4 is broadcasting such an exploitative parenting series as Bringing Up Baby – the last part of which is to be shown tomorrow. Many techniques used in these programmes are outdated and completely fly in the face of our scientific knowledge about brain development in very young babies.

That anyone should be billed as an expert and allowed to promote ideas such as not making eye contact with babies and not comforting them when they are in distress is at best irresponsible and at worst dangerous. And to see these theories being put into practice with real babies in the name of entertainment is deeply worrying.

Last year, the Family and Parenting Institute surveyed parents to ask them their opinions on TV parenting programmes and some 83% of the respondents said that they found a technique in these programmes helpful to them. So with these programmes having such an influence on parents it is shocking that broadcasters are not exercising more responsibility.

Sadly the exploitation of both babies and children in the pursuit of high ratings is becoming ever more common: the BBC3 programme Baby Borrowers earlier this year was another case in point where babies and young children were "lent" to teenage couples in a programme that was intended to bring in viewers by being shocking.

We call on all production companies to stop making television programmes which give parents irresponsible advice and turn the suffering of tiny babies and children into adult entertainment.

Mary MacLeod
Chief Executive
Family and Parenting Institute

Penny Mansfield
Director
One plus One

Dorit Braun
Chief Executive
Parentline Plus

Dr Shirley Gracias
Chair
The Association for Infant Mental Health UK

Dr Cheryll Adams
Acting Lead Professional Officer
Unite-Community Practitioners and Health Visitors Association

Christine Bidmead
Chair of Health Visiting Forum
Unite-Community Practitioners and Health Visitors Association

Stephen Scott BSc FRCP FRCPsych
Professor of Child Health & Behaviour
Consultant Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist
King’s College, London

Helen Dent
Chief Executive
Family Welfare Association

Parents’ Week runs from Monday 15th to Sunday 21st October and has the theme 'Turning lives around: what works for vulnerable families'. Go to www.familyandparenting.org/parentsweek for more details and to register for your free guide to working with vulnerable families.
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http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/parentingshows/

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