Time online must be put to good use

By calling for young people to spend more time online, former GCHQ director Robert Hannigan is going against perceived wisdom but he may have made a valid point.

Mr Hannigan thinks complaining parents are merely voicing their fear of the unknown when they demand their charges spend less time in front of screens.

Parents of other generations would have been equally scathing of television and, before that, radio. Perhaps cavedwelling Neanderthal children were told to stop spending so much time scrawling on the walls and do something more useful with their time.

Like it or not, the internet has become the tool through which the world now operates. An inability to navigate it is a crippling defect for any young person, from school starters to those entering the workplace.

Online activity must be balanced with other life skills and it can be sad to witness entire groups of children glued to screens instead of engaging in traditional interaction.

Similarly, the perils of the internet should not be ignored and adult supervision is required to keep young users safe from the darker elements which proliferate.

In that case, adult use and understanding should be increased rather than limiting youngsters.

The issue may not be with the amount of time young people spend online, but what they are doing with that time.