Just as the dust begins to settle from the fallout of the Government’s response to the Covid pandemic, new research from the Institute of Fiscal Studies shows that nearly half of U.K. parents report their children’s social and emotional skills seriously deteriorated during lockdowns, with young kids most affected. The Mail has the story.
Adults whose jobs were disrupted by the crisis, including those on furlough, were more likely to report that their offspring suffered development problems.
Youngsters aged between four and seven were significantly more likely (52%) to be affected than 12- to 15 year-olds (42%), the research by the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) reported.
Furiously responding to the findings, campaigners blamed Covid lockdowns and school closures for having a “catastrophic” impact on Britain’s young.
The IFS surveyed 6,095 parents in England with children aged four to 16 about the impact of the first year of the pandemic.
It found that nearly half (48%) reported that their sons and daughters’ social and emotional skills deteriorated.
Children whose parents were furloughed were “significantly more likely to experience a worsening in their socio-emotional skills than those whose parents had not been furloughed (51% versus 45%)”.
Researchers said the social and emotional skills of children whose parents had stable labour market experiences throughout the pandemic – whether that saw their parents employed or unemployed throughout – “held up better on average than the skills of children whose families faced more economic instability”.
But they found no evidence that children from disadvantaged families fared worse, in contrast to previous research looking at lost academic learning.
The IFS study was designed to screen for emotional or behavioural problems.
Questions focused on whether parents found their children to be “easily scared”, “constantly fidgeting or squirming”, or “generally obedient”.
Responding to the report, Arabella Skinner, of the parents’ campaign group UsForThem, said children became “collateral damage” during the pandemic.
She said: “The pandemic policies did not take into consideration the impact on children.”
Ms. Skinner added: “There were many occasions when warnings were ignored and children were in effect collateral damage.
“It is an unavoidable fact that many of our children’s development has been negatively impacted by the pandemic restrictions.”
And she insisted: “The Government must take action now – they need to support all the services which support our children and ensure that this never happens again.”
Tory MP Esther McVey added: “We must now accept and learn from the extent of the damage school closures and lockdowns have caused.”
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: Karol Sikora in the Telegraph says that the lockdown policy was our generation’s greatest error.
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Why not just give the job to that fellah, Mary Wanaker?
It is actually time to put the BBC out of its misery.
I’m sorry kids but Aunty Beeb has to go to Switzerland for an appointment with Dignitas. She’s delusional and incontinent and we just can’t look after her any more. It’ll be painless, I promise.
Auntie? Gender Gestapo en route.
The only way to do it is to stop funding them. Don’t pay the TV tax.
The Uniparty state will never ever put the BBC out of its misery as you suggest. The British people who despise the BBC have to do that by not paying the licence fee and never, ever voting for the Uniparty.
Put it out of our misery.
The state has no business running a news and media empire nor forcing people to pay for such a thing
I don’t care what changes they make and who they sack, it cannot and should not be saved
Before TV and Radio there were newspapers. Let’s all remember which notable countries had state newspapers.
“The state has no business running a news and media empire nor forcing people to pay for such a thing”
They don’t. Nobody is forced own a TV. We junked ours 20 years ago, sick of funding the Propaganda Arm of the Liberal Elite.
Sorry. Nothing to do with the state. All the more so as you can watch anything you want using the internet, and VPNS will mask your ID to use the iPlayer if you want to watch BBC trash.
You are technically correct in that no-one is forced to own a TV, but if you want to watch TV you are legally obliged to pay a tax even if you don’t watch the BBC.
Do not have a TV, most radio is dire nowadays also preaching messages I do not want, so for simple entertainment used to listen to TalkSport on football. Stopped during covid as every 3 minutes pushing the jabs, but now as with BBC too is full of women commentators who add nothing, unable to give any interesting chat on former players etc.and also trying to push womens’ football.
Our once extraordinary and mighty institution, surely the most respected media organisation anywhere in the world, and with the longest history, has more or less become the mouthpiece of the Labour Party. What a crying shame.
Who can forget all the wonderful programming: it nurtured great comedians and comedies like Blackadder, Fawlty Towers and OFAH; it pioneered spectacular nature documentaries with David Attenborough; it gave us lovely children’s programming like Blue Peter, and cool teens shows like Top of the Pops; it generally gave us fair and impartial news, with dignified newsreaders; it catered to all of Britain, to all British people, and no wonder we nicknamed it Auntie. It was a national treasure.
And of course, it gave us epic sports programming: Match of the Day, Grandstand, Wimbledon, World Cup, Rugby, Cricket…and of course Football Focus! Legendary programs that were part of our lives growing up.
Now it’s the Labour Party’s Ministry of Truth, belting out leftist messaging whether we like it or not, and helping to spread the message by ‘correcting’ any programs that need fixing. And the result is a collapse in public opinion: it is now despised by the public. Cultural vandalism of a national treasure.
Strangely, all of these ‘Labour’ policies are being implemented by the ‘Conservatives’, despite what the latter claim they believe.
Agree with the above but “no wonder we nicknamed it Auntie”…?
I get the impression that nobody in the audience did so. Its a term beloved of the insiders and employees
Not just the mouthpiece of the Labour Party. The mouthpiece of Liberal Progressives, eco fundamentalists and Cultural Marxists who can be found even in political parties claiming to be Conservative.
Maoist Focus.
I have no idea why anyone watches television unless they’re into pain. Of course the resons are obvious – the addictive, depressing and trance-inducing effect of looking at a screen (which coincidentally makes mind control far easier), the fact that it is easy if you have to do hard physical work all day just to sit back and let your brain be filled when you get home. And in a lonely atomised society it might provide company for many poor souls whilst poisoning them at the same time. And that is before you even consider the especially pernicious content of the BBC. It is vile and I am glad that young people barely watch it or listen to it.
I would agree most TV is pretty dire now, but if I had given up watching I would never have seen Breaking Bad,Better Call Saul or Stranger Things (all Netflix) which are all excellent. There must be many other series, and some of them would have been from the BBC (pre woke days) which were also good viewing. More recently the ITV dramatisation of the post office Horizon scandal showed the power that a well made programme can have. Selective viewing is surely the answer, rather than outright never watching anything on the box out of principle.
The boomers are dying off. My generation, generation X has no time for the BBC. Later generations even less. It is literally dying by the day. Didn’t have to be that way but that’s what happens when you start worshipping money. You never control it, even less than with heroin. It controls you and it makes you do far worse things than opiates would ever make you do.
Is this your culture now? You sit around and talk about this nonsense? Can you not see how you look to the outside world?
Lets face it tv watchers, Jefferson said that the price of liberty is eternal vigilance. Not only were you not vigilant you were happy creating and participating in the construction of the black iron prison. You need to find a place of atonement first.
Thanks. It sounds so boring that I will never bother with it.
Saint and Greaves please – that was funny.
The BBC never misses an opportunity to push the woke agenda. It’s why I’ve stopped watching anything it produces.
If you don’t like ‘Football Focus” don’t watch it. There’s plenty of other stuff on.
Why anyone watches BBC at all is beyond me. I’ve not watched or listened to BBC for years and don’t pay the TV licence tax.
Everyone that watches or funds the BBC are complicit in what they do. So stop whinging and deprive them of their funding.
Oh dear you clearly aren’t learning the lessons Aunty is trying to teach, more lessons for you with detention with Gary
You often get the same on Sky Sports News where they will rant on about some gay or gender issue for the first 12 minutes before they finally get around to talking about sport. ———-Professional footballers should not be taking knees of waving flags and allowing themselves to be used for political purposes. —–I hope they don’t start preaching to fans about the climate or Net Zero next because football actually has a carbon footprint about the size of Belgium.
As a soon to be late STH holder at West Bromwich Albion. They are still taking the knee to serial criminal George Floyd, whereas the dead of two world wars get 1 minute per season. Shoot me now. West Bromwich Albion have been captured by the Woke crowd.
Joey Barton on X gives his dry, drôle, forthright insights in a thick Liverpudlian accent that you could cut with a chainsaw, into what has happened to footie, and footie programmes on the BBC as well as women’s footie, which he calls nonsense pottery.
I am not a fan of footie, nor Joey Barton – but I am warming to him.
In the past the men watched the football and the women usually were not interested and went and did something else. Imagine if men suddenly within the space of a 5 years all started to want to form Netball Leagues and get jobs commenting on Netball, would that not be a bit odd? ——Yes
Or if men were suddenly to force themselves into the beauty industry: start making ‘get ready with me’ videos; talking about our ‘weekend resets’; our morning shower routines; getting teary-eyed when talking about our ‘hectic week’ ahead etc
Women would hate it, they would think it’s an invasion of their space, and they would despise these weirdo men for trying to behave like women. They want real men – men who are responsible, respectful, hardworking, skilful, kind and considerate. They definitely don’t want pathetic dweebs
I’m sorry but I can’t bear women buffing out at the gym, playing rugby and doing boxing etc, it’s repulsive. They’re trying to compete at men’s tasks, but unfortunately it’s difficult/impossible to compete with men in this respect – with increased fitness, better diets, and almost unlimited carbs and protein, some men are absolutely huge these days!
Instead why not try to make themselves as beautiful, magical and effeminate as possible? Actually it’s a superpower: a man goes weak at the knees at the sight of a beautiful woman, and she can get him to do whatever she pleases! It’s the exact opposite of the messages that are being fed to young women now