I’m proof a nanny can make you a worse mum Or,

Jenny eclair has never been my favourite comic — but she does have an admirable habit of saying the unsayable, especially when it comes to the trials of being a middle-aged woman.

This time, though, she’s really poked a hornets’ nest. Because she’s only gone and broken the first rule of working motherhood: don’t mention the nanny.

For most middle- class, working mothers like myself, even admitting to having a nanny is taboo.

in fact, the whole concept of childcare has a way of short-circuiting our internal feminist wiring.

On the one hand, it’s our right to have meaningful careers; on the other, it’s also our right to have children.

There’s j ust one ti ny problem: who’s going to look after the kids?

in the early days of feminism, the answer was men. We even invented a special type of man to accomplish this aim — new Man.

new Man cooked, cleaned, empathised. He was a model of sexual correctness. He was also a monumental drip and no one really fancied him. and so, quietly and rather surreptitiously, we showed him the door.

So now we have the common situation where both parents go out to work — but it remains mostly the women who take care of matters domestic. and that means a nanny.

iF you prefer, childminder, carer, mother’s help, au pair, housekeeper, domestic Pa. call them what you will, it all boils down to the same thing: a wife.

That is the great paradox of feminism: for every woman forging ahead in the workplace, there’s another taking her place in the home.

now aged 55, eclair has one daughter, Phoebe, 26. ‘i left a lot of the rearing of Phoebe to her brilliant nanny, Vanessa,’ she told the radio Times this week. ‘it worked very well, but there are consequences.

‘For me, it means i’m ten years behind with my mothering of my daughter because i basically didn’t do it until she was about 12.’

This rang so many bells with me it made my teeth jangle.

i remember all too clearly the way, when the children were small, i used to dread weekends — not because i didn’t love them, but because i didn’t feel in control of the situation.

During the week, you see, my role was essentially that of an oldfashioned Fifties father. i would kiss their little smiley faces goodbye in the morning, returning in the evening to find them fed, freshly bathed and sleepy, just in time for a cuddle and a bedtime story. a benign, but essentially distant presence.

as Jenny suggests, i had arrested parental development. i l acked confidence because i simply hadn’t embraced parenthood yet.

and a parent who lacks confidence is one with no authority and, therefore, no control — and no real relationship with their child.

The turning point came when my nanny ran the mothers’ race at sports day for me — and won.

i’d just had a major operation, so was genuinely off games. Still, even by my standards, it was a bit outrageous.

i took steps to become hands on. i moved sideways at work, scaled down my hours, worked in the evenings.

now, i’m probably only f i ve years behind i n my parental development. luckily for me, my children are very forgiving (or at least my son is; my daughter is 12 — she forgives no one).

as my son said to me the other day: ‘i don’t mind when you’re late picking me up from school, Mummy, because i always know when there’s no one to meet me at the gate it’s going to be you — and that makes me happy.’

in other words, you’re a bit useless, Mum, but at least you’re reliably useless.

Fact is, nannies make life possible for working mothers, but they are no substitute for being a parent.

That, i’m afraid, is the one thing you simply cannot delegate. accordIng to crime scientists at birmingham university, the key characteristics of serial killers are: 1) an addiction to power; 2) a desire to manipulate; 3) a huge ego; 4) Superficial charm; and 5) High standing in the community. oh dear, sounds like most of the House of commons to me.