Mums know best — as Jamie Oliver understands all too well

HE HAS weathered abuse from the barons of the sugar industry after trying to stop the young guzzling fizzy drinks, and taken on the wrath of parents who stuff their offspring full of chips as he campaigned for healthy school meals.

Yet there’s one critic Jamie Oliver can’t ignore — his mum.

When he proudly posted a picture of his seven- month- old son on Instagram, the last thing he would have expected was a lesson in parenting from Sally Oliver.

The picture showed baby River Rocket grinning as he lay in his cute babygrow on — heaven forbid — a tiled floor. ‘This adorable child!’ Jamie’s mum commented. ‘He looks so like you as a baby! But please get him off that hard floor now.’

Her admonition led to a flurry of advice from parents about the grubbiness of floors and Jamie’s apparent negligence. One person warned that leaving the baby there could lead to head injuries, while my favourite comment was: ‘Love that your mum busted you! Go Granny!’

But then, the truth is our mums always know best. It doesn’t matter who you are, you’re never too old — and Jamie is now 41 — or too successful to be chastised by Mum. And that’s how it should be. Jamie concedes he would never have become the multi-millionaire Naked Chef without his down-to- earth upbringing working as a kid in his parent’s Essex pub-cum-restaurant.

It is there he was taught the lessons of life — about hard work, aspiration, loyalty and above all the importance of family.

It’s because of mum and her values that he is so successful and so devoted to lovely wife Jools and their five children.

And why, in contrast to so many celebrities, success doesn’t seem to have gone to his head.

As our thoughts turn to our families at Easter, Sally Oliver’s intervention could not be more timely.

There isn’t a day when I don’t think of mum or her advice, the best of which was remember every day to count your blessings.

The chef’s mum said: ‘I was only teasing Jamie.’ But I bet he’ll put a blanket under River next time he places him on a tile floor.