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THE dictionary on my desk tells me that the definition of respect is an attitude of deference, admiration or esteem'.

Many parents or teachers may now be bursting into hysterical laughter.

So where did it all go wrong?

More importantly, at what point did children stop worrying what their parents or teachers might think or do and the parents and teachers start worrying what their children might think and do?

Because that is the point where lack of parental control and discipline - the essence of respect within the family unit and school - broke down.

And I'm not talking about physical discipline here. I'm talking about the point where the word No' provokes a reaction so negative or so aggressive that many parents are put under a lot of pressure to justify that decision.

To return to the days of the cane and the slipper would be a retrograde step, but how on earth can this society - and specifically this British society - return to the kind of respect that was part and parcel of the lives of youngsters growing up in the '50s and '60s?

I knew when to stop asking for things when I was young, yet today's spoiled brats, with their own bedrooms (no three in a room for this lot), their PSPs, PS2s, MP3s, DVDs and TVs - gladly launch into a row that might end in a letter to the European Court of Human Rights or a call to Childline.

We watch TV and see characters that treat their parents and teachers like the filth on their shoes and wonder why our own children act like brats.

I mourn the fact that somewhere along the line - possibly when we were all just too busy to notice - our children managed to deflect every bit of the blame away from themselves.

7:00pm Tuesday 13th May 2008

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