Rias – the insurance company for the over 50's – tell me that it's we grandparents who'll be enabling our offspring to go out and celebrate Valentine's Day by minding their children for them.  This doesn't surprise us, as we know just how much we contribute to society today.  We're always hearing – and always blogging (forgive me!) about how much we help out today's modern families where both parents have to work simply to get by.

But I guess I was surprised – and impressed by the figures! Rias's survey of 1200 grandparents suggests that we will save UK mums and dads 15. 3 million pounds in childcare costs today alone!  And that one million grandparents are likely to be stepping up to the plate to help out….that's 10% of all UK grandparents.

So let's give ourselves a huge pat on the back for our stirling work – not forgetting that this evening's child care probably consists of getting the little darlings into bed and sound asleep in their parents absence.  Not always the easiest task!

Peter Corfield, Managing Director at RIAS, comments: “Grandparents are often the unsung heroes in families’ lives and their commitments this Valentine’s Day proves it more than ever! With today’s parents struggling against rising childcare costs and cuts to Child Benefit for some families, it’s nice to know that they can still rely on their mums and dads to look after their grandchildren so they can enjoy a well-deserved night out.'

We agree 100% – of course – but we wouldn't want him -  or anyone -  to forget that we take on these tasks not just out of a sense of duty but also because we care.  Time spent with our grandchildren is precious and we value these moments probably just as much as the parents value time to themselves.

We had a busy weekend with the grandchildren – two boys, aged 5 and 3 who are a match for any adult.  They're lively, full of fun, bursting with energy and interested in everything.  You can't make any kind of passing remark without being picked up on it.  So when Grandpa blows a fuse by poking a knife down the toaster causing the lights to fuse, this has to be explained in intricate detail!

Same applies when Lucas, the eldest, discovered worms in his poo on their first evening with us.  He wasn't upset or disgusted, just interested.  So the whole life cycle of worms and how they get into you had to be discussed in great detail.  This was good for it led to a whole weekend of heavy-duty hand-washing, before and after every visit to the loo, before every meal and before any food preparation.  All of it time-consuming but all of it good practice and beautifully hygienic.

When we delivered the boys back to their own home on Sunday afternoon, in order to give them tea and put them to bed there, I managed to cause a second blow-out and plunge the house into darkness.  This was a bit dramatic as it was just getting dark, it's a new house so none of us knows our way round that well, and even having found the fuse-box I couldn't seem to trip the fuses back again.  So I set the boys on finding candles for Grandpa to light as I continued to try to resolve the problem. 

 I was bombarded with questions the while:  'Granny i've forgotten what is exactly a power cut?' 'Granny what are you doing?' while Grandpa had his work cut out preventing Arthur (3) followig him around extinguishing the candles as fast as he lit them!

All was well in the end – I fixed the fuse and we had light back in time to bath the boys and put them  to bed safely in a cosy, warm house.  Then we sank onto the sofa exhausted!

I'm thinking about all of this today in the light of  Liz Truss's new child/carer ratios for nurseries and child minders.  Two is a handful for anyone. I can't begin to think how a single person is supposed to manage many more successfully. It may be possible to 'get through' the day, but there'll be no time for answering complex questions, no time for explaining why it's not a good idea to blow candles out, no time for cooking healthy meals, and no time for really good listening when a child's upset.

The children will notice.  They don't like being fobbed off. So I think we need to be careful before embracing these changes or we're in danger of breeding a generation of children who feel they don't matter.

Like most grandparents around the country today, we always seem to be on 'standby' for emergencies.  And another of those has arrived this weekend.  It had been the 'other' grandparents turn to help out whilst our son, the journalist,  is away working in Kurdistan and his wife fits in her two twelve-hour weekend shifts as a paediatric nurse.  Two careers which are not particularly compatible with emergency child care arrangements!

But, hey ho, the other grandmother has suddenly developed shingles, poor thing, so is completely out of action for a while.

it's lucky that we didn't have anything much planned, and we're looking forward to having them for a whole weekend to ourselves.  It'll be exhausting – but we'll try and plan in regular rests for the old folk whilst the boys run around and tire themselves out!

In fact, it's the emotional element that I find most exhausting nowadays. Gone are the days when we could just bundle them up and take them out.  At 3 and 5 they have very strong minds of their own and are far less easily cajoled into doing things that we plan.  And at the same time they don't always understand that what they want to do is not possible.  The 5 year old requested that we visit the local 'fun night' this weekend…..which is a Christmas fun night that happens only once a year just before Christmas!  And last time they came he didn't want to go to see the soldiers Change the Guard in Windsor whereas his younger brother did.  He's seen it once too often, I guess, whereas Arthur is a few visits behind.

So I'm gearing myself up for a weekend of negotiation, explanationn and patience,.

Wish me luck!

I was really interested to read this piece in today's Daily Mail about how young women today are weaker than their grandmothers.  In fact, I think the authors have it slightly wrong – for I believe it's women of all ages today, including my generation, who are weaker than our grandmothers.  It seems that we're all so obsessed with being thin that we don't want to build muscle.  So although today's young women may think they're keeping fit by going to the gym or exercise classes, their muscles are deteriorating along the way.

I've blogged before about reading a letter from my grandmother who, in her seventies, walked several miles, cut the lawn with a hand-mower and then bottled fruit all afternoon.  This was perfectly normal activity for her and I wouldn't be surprised if she'd also done a load of hand-washing that same day, and wrung it all through the wringer which she kept just otuside the back door, before hanging it all up on the line, bringing it in and ironing it.

She did all her own housework, shopped most days by walking into the village and back, and took care of a fair-sized garden.

Gym membership would have meant nothing to her!  Indeed I'm sure she'd laugh out loud at the thought of paying money to get fit when it was perfectly possible for her to stay fit and healthy until the age of 92 simply by taking (really good) care of a house and home.

I've since found another letter that she wrote aged 77.  She describes walking to and fro to church – twice in a day – and making big teas for people who drop in.  Having run out of bread, she has to whip up some scones to serve with butter and jam, and of course, there were no electric whisks or food processors in those days!

No wonder her arm muscles retained their strength and she could carry on with such household chores until very close to her death.

I know my own arm muscles leave a lot to be desired: writing on a keyboard doesn't use many of them at all! So I'm resolving here and now to clean more windows, polish the furniture and whisk up eggs, batters and cakes by hand too!

The story in today's Telegraph about nurseries having a funding crisis because more and more grandparents are taking over childcare doesn't surprise us one bit.

We've talked often here about how much effort today's grandparents put in to helping out with child care.  Most of us do it because we know our young people simply couldn't survive wtihout our help.  Life today is so expensive that most parents feel under pressure to maintain two careers in order to finance their lifestyle.  And many grandparents think nothing of helping out whenever they can.

But we do have to be careful, I feel, not to take the care and time offered by grandparents for granted. The older generation too have their own lives to live.  And many of us, as we age, become frailer and less able to cope with long periods of child care.  So it's surely important that, as a nation, we take the whole issue of nursery care for children seriously and ensure that there is a plentiful supply, at a reasonable price for everyone?

The NSPCC has a good, new initiative designed to bring a smile to the face of our grandchildren this Christmas, whilst at the same time making some money for their excellent cause.

The idea is that you can request a letter from Santa for each of your grandchildren and that they'll be tailored to suit each child based on information you provide.

So the child is likely to be impressed that Father Christmas is privy to some 'inside' information about them – such as a best friend's name, or their recent history of school work or behaviour – and be thrilled that he's written directly to them at their home address.

There's a choice of letters to suit different age groups and everyone who requests a letter this year will be entered into a competition to win a trip to Lapland for two adults and two children next December.

But the real value of this idea, it seems to me, is that everyone who organises a letter from Santa is asked to make a suggested donation of at least £5 which is going to help the NSPCC with their amazing work helping children who are abused or neglected. Sadly their work goes on all year round because children suffer all year round:  Christmas is no exception.  So doing a small thing for our own grandchildren this Chrismtas will help other children who are not nearly so fortunate al year round.

http://christmas.nspcc.org.uk/

I was looking after the 3-year-old yesterday and because the weather wasn't good, he didn't want to go to any of the local parks.  So after a bit of a walk we popped into the cafe on the corner of his road where he's well known to the owner and staff.  The owner has befriended Arthur and his brother since they moved in a couple of years ago and most times when the boys pass he pops out to give them a lollypop or sweetie or playfully chase them down the road.  So I too have come to know him over the years and have often enjoyed his cappucinos.

But crisis!  Yesterday he had no lollipops – and he was busily occupied with a packed cafe and loads of breakfast orders.

He could tell Arthur was patiently anticipating a lolly but apologised that he didn't have any.  Then he asked a young man who was standing about if he'd take Arthur with him to the Post Office to buy one.

Help!  What was grandmother to do!  I didn't know this second man from Adam and was absolutely sure I couldn't let Arthur out of my sight with him.  Yet, he seemed pleasant enough and tried to reassure me that he worked there.  I still balked and eventually said – with everyone else in the cafe listening in! - 'I'm really sorry but I don't know you, I'm sure you're perfectly safe but I really can't let my grandson go off with someone I don't know'.

It felt like a totally reasonably stand and I'm 100% sure I was right and did the right thing but I felt such a heel. It's a horrid thing to have to say to a person's face. I felt bad to be turning him down and bad that the whole cafe could see I didn't trust him!

Happily the difficult situation had a good outcome when the owner himself became available and offered to go with Arthur himself.  I knew the parents  would be OK with this -  and so let him go.  I apologised again to the other chap and Arthur soon came back beaming with two lollies – an extra one for his brother.

So I hope my name's not mud now in the corner cafe.  But even if it is that's a small price to pay for my grandson's safety.

However, I'm sure all you grandparents out there will understand the wretchedness of my dilemma.  Our grandchildren are so precious – and when they're in our total care, it feels like a huge responsibility.  We instinctively know what's right and wrong – but when put on the spot, we sometimes have to make a stand in order to ensure their safety.

In my time on Nationwide in the 70's I interviewed many fascinating people.  Many of them, of course, were famous – and I was always interested to meet the big names and try to find out what they were really like.  You could tell a lot about them by how they treated the folks around them, how they were in make-up or on the studio floor.  Celebrity wasn't quite the same then as now – and it didn't seem to go to peoples' heads as it does today.  So, more often than not, I was surprised by how so many of them came across as modest, humble people.  Those that impressed me merited a place in my diary – and today I was drawn back to it to read what I wrote on March 12 1977.  Here goes:

Interviewed Gary Glitter about his retirement and final farewell concernt on Sunday in Victoria. A very soft and gentle person;  he came across as interested in us all and complimented me on the colour of my dress.  He was wearing cerise trousers and jumper and he remarked that we didn't 'clash'!  He announced in advance that he wasn't going to talk to any of the press about the reasons for his retirment so he wouldn't be telling me.  He said: 'You realise I'm not going to tell you, don't you?'  I replied that I understood but that my editor didn't so I'd have to probe.  He was very amenable and friendly.

I'm not making any judgements here: I'll leave it for you to make your own.  But I'm cringing.

Considering all the fuss over last night's ITV programme on the allegatiions against Jimmy Saville makes me wonder why I wasn't aware of them whilst working at the BBC in the 70's.

But then I recall that things were very different in those days.  Things were brushed under thet carpet on a regular basis.  When my own father chose to leave my mother during the 70's, it felt to her like the worst thing in the world – not necessarily because of the fact that she would be left alone, but because of the shame.  Because all the neighbours would inevitably find out, because her standing in the community would suffer, because  no one else she knew or socialised with had ever been left, had ever been through a divorce, had ever suffered a marriage break-up.

That helps, I think, put things into perspective because this was still a time when the supposed 'freedoms' of the 60's had not largely impinged on the general population.  Families that had troubles kept them behind closed doors.

As a young radio reporter, I was asked to put together a piece on 'wife-beating' ( as it was known then) for BBC Woman's Hour in around 1974.  And I remember well how my producer talked about it as a 'taboo'.  Not enough was known about what happened behind the nation's closed doors, and we, with the help of Erin Pizzey and her new refuge in Chiswick, helped expose it.  Looking back, it seems unbelievable that such horrors were regularly hushed up.  But that's simply the way it was.

And I guess that's why whatever Jimmy Saville did with his hoardes of young fans, was also hushed up.  People really weren't open and honest like we are today: 'dirty' secrets were kept simply because they were 'dirty' and people didn't want to acknowledge such things happened.  Also, of course, things were much more heirachical – young people deferred to their elders and didn't dare complain or challenge for fear or losing their jobs.

So although I feel terrible for the girls concerned and only wish more had been done to help them, I don't feel it's fair to look back at what happened then, and make judgements, through the lens of today.

Of course, today, we're all on the look-out for evil because so much of it has been exposed that we're now all fully aware of what devilish things can happen.

But I'll also never forget some more words of my Woman's Hour producer.  After the success of our wife-beating feature, she expressed a desire to expose Britain's last taboo – incest.

Can you believe that I was horrified because I really could not believe that incest existed in any great degree in our society.  How wrong I was proved to be over the course of the last 4 decades – but perhaps that innocence goes a little way to explain how things could be, and were, hushed up.  But it also, of course, goes to explain how people could get away with outrageous behaviours – because people weren't aware of the full horrors of human behaviour – and those who were aware were more than content to keep it quiet.

It's so sad that older people are getting such late diagnoses for their cancers, which are often, it seems not spotted until they're admitted to A&E for other reasons.

It's understandable that the elderly don't like to worry their GP's constantly:  they are, after all, of a stoical generation who suffered hardship when young and have carried their strong spirits along with them as they age.  Many are reluctant to admit to any failings or weaknesses and many feel that they'll be considered a nuisance if they trouble their GP's too often.

I well remember my late mother's GP confining her to 3 issues during her 10 minute consultations!  I know he did this because of long experience of dealing with her many hypochondrial anxieties – nonetheless it felt a bit harsh.  And so she's exactly the kind of person who would have taken along her arthritis, her insomnia and possibly some kind of chest infection but would have neglected to mention any symptoms she'd spotted which were less obvious, and less clearly expressed.  She could so easily have slipped through the net, but fortunately, despite her constant fear of cancer, she survived to 91 without it.

I suppose the point I'm making is that it's all too easy to intimidate the elderly into falling into line, and into not being a nuisance.  Perhaps we all need to pay attention to the fact that our elderly very often don't have a voice, and are all too quick to dismiss their own concerns about their health for fear of rocking the boat.

We should surely encourage them instead to speak up for themselves and get the best treatment possible.  They've earned it after all.