Kirstie Allsopp has questioned if parents being fearful of their children exploring the world is due to the 24-hour news coverage and a belief that the world is a “worse place”.
The Location, Location, Location presenter, 52, received mixed opinions online after revealing she allowed her 15-year-old son to go interrailing across Europe with his 16-year-old friend this summer.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Wednesday, Allsopp said she agreed to it as she feels he is a “very sensible young man”, but admitted she struggled emotionally as she missed him over the summer break.
Reflecting on how perspectives have changed on allowing young people freedom, she said: “In previous generations, people did things far younger.
“We are looking at a mental health crisis with young people. A lot of people are talking about it and writing about it.
“We have to ask ourselves – how much of this is because of our fear and our worry, and how much of our fear and worry stems from 24-hour news and a lot of belief that the world is a worse place?”
She pointed out her elders had taken on major pursuits as teenagers, including her father-in-law joining the Arctic convoys of the Second World War aged 16, her mother-in-law going to university in South Africa aged 15 and her father joining the army at 17.
The discussion came about after Allsopp shared on X, formerly Twitter, that her son had just returned from three weeks of interrailing, travelling through Europe usually via train, with his friend.
She wrote: “For obvious budget reasons, inter-railing isn’t on the cards for everyone, but in this increasingly risk-averse world it’s vital that we find any ways we can to give our children the confidence that only comes from trusting them.
“Of course I missed spending the summer with our son, but I’m so proud of him & my loss is nothing compared to his gain & the encyclopaedic knowledge he now has of the differences between one McDonalds & another, if we’re afraid our children will also be afraid, if we let go, they will fly.”
Her post sparked a conversation online with some criticising her for letting him go while others praised her decision.
Discussing her decision on Radio 4, Allsopp also she did not want her son, who is young for his school year, to be left behind by his peers.
“He’s 16 today and he’s a summer-born child, so he’s very young for his year,” she said.
My little boy has returned from 3 weeks inter-railing, he’ll be 16 on Wednesday so he went with a mate who’s already 16 due to hostel/travel restrictions, but they organised the whole thing; Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Marseille, Toulouse, Barcelona & Madrid 1/3
— Kirstie Allsopp (@KirstieMAllsopp) August 19, 2024
“As any parent of a summer-born knows, there’s always this dilemma that their friends will turn key ages before them, and do you hold them back simply because of the number of days in a year? Or do you say ‘Yes, you can do what your cohort is doing’. So, I think that’s the first thing.”
She continued: “It’s strange to say I didn’t struggle with it on a practical level, because he came to me with a proposal, he’s a very sensible young man, he’s never been in trouble at school, and so when he said, ‘I want to do this’, I thought, ‘Right, okay, good on you’.
“I struggled on an emotional level that I knew I’d be not seeing him for quite a lot of this summer.
“He’s only got two more years at school and then he’ll probably go to university ,and then he’ll be away. So, as a parent, it’s always that thing of ‘Oh, I want to be with my child’, or is it good for them to do their own thing?”
Allsopp, who is mother to sons Oscar Hercules and Bay Atlas with husband Ben Andersen, also noted parents worry about different things and, for her, her fear is her children travelling in cars with new drivers and drugs, rather than travelling.
Asked if she would have treated a daughter the same way, she said she would as her parents treated her the same way as her brother.
“Obviously, girls face different dangers. Statistically, actually, boys are more at danger from violent attacks from strangers,” she said.
“The dangers that girls can come across, as we all know, are often from people they know.”
