Ah.. New Labour social engineering. By now, weren't we all supposed to be embracing European cosmopolitan cafe cultured enlightenment, reading the Guardian, engaging in thoughtful and witty repartee, sipping latte until the small hours, picking at Spaghetti ("enjoy!"), commenting incisively on the latest exhibition at the latest people's art gallery and smiling self indulgently at our little mites reading up on their human rights? Dear god, how I long for a proper smoke filled pub.
Perhaps posters here are allowing their Chiante/Raki/Sangria-filled holidays to cloud their memories of European kids. In Italy the parents dote on their offspring and discipline is generally absent - many is the time that I've seen kids running riot in restaurants, just as their Anglo-Saxon cousins do.