The publicity for The Dangerous Book for Boys had me thinking about my own childhood and wondering where society went so out of shape that kids went, well, out of shape.

I was lucky to grow up on a middle class estate which was built on an area of cleared common land, the remaining common land included woods, old air-raid shelters and around the edge a couple of farmers fields. Every summer from when I was 7 until 12 (at which point I discovered girls) we would be on the common from eight in the morning until tea time and then back out until dark. We had tree camps, camps on the ground made from ferns (when I smell the ferns in my garden I have one of those Proustian moments), we played football and if the weather wasn't suitable for going on the common we played football or held the Olympics down our road - I guess we were luckier than people like my Mum and Dad who had grown up in the East End. In the winter it was too dark to go on the common but I was fortunate to go to football training twice a week under floodlights at my local semi-professional club where we were coached by Dai Davies who had kept goal for Cardiff City.

When we went , duing the Easter holidays, to visit my grandparents in Hornchurch, Essex, my brother and I would buy a Red Rover ticket and see how far we could go, by bus and tube, between breakfast and lunch - this was between the ages of 11 and say 14. Once we even caught the train from Upminster to Shoeburyness just to see what it was like.

The point is, my parents weren't worried at all, this was before mobile phones, the only money we would carry would be for a can of coke and a mars bar. They actually encouraged us to get out there and find out about the world. I remember one Sunday going out on my own and catching the tube to Victoria and walking back across town to Liverpool Street from where I caught a train to Romford and then a bus home, all before lunch.

Nathalie is now twelve and whilst she isn't ready for a day out of the trains unsupervised we let her go into town with her friends and they all love going down the local shops. Again, like me, I think she is lucky to live in an area where there is little trouble, ironic really giving the fact th at she's been bullied at Scouts and school, and where you can walk to the shops rather than go by public transport, although she likes to do that as well.

She actually came home the other weekend after being out with a friend for the afternoon and told us that her friend had never been on a bus before, at twelve! When I was twelve I knew every stop on the District and Central Lines by heart - I don't suppose it's of any use now though!

Perhaps instead of thinking we need to keep our children in and buy them electronic gadgetry to keep them occupied we allowed them to explore the world around them, fuel their imagination and let them get dirty again we might see a better world in the future.