Good Morning Britain host Richard Madeley has revealed he is ashamed of hitting his children when they were younger.
On Wednesday’s Good Morning Britain (February 23), the TV host debated the new law coming into Wales which aims to prevent parents from smacking their children.
Richard has two children with his wife and former Richard and Judy co-host Judy Finnigan.
They share Jack, who is now 35, and Chloe, now 34.
On the show, he said: “For full disclosure, when my children were growing up, I certainly never used a stick.
“But once or twice, I think with Jack – he was the firstborn – I think I sort of tapped his bottom a couple of times with the flat of my hand.
(Image: ITV)
“Do you know what? I always thought that was a point of failure, my failure. I felt ashamed of it.”
Richard Madeley also shared that he was hit a lot by his father during his childhood.
He also said: “When I was a little boy I was hit quite a lot by my dad, who I love very much and he was a great father, but I was hit quite a lot.
“It was typical of the day, we are talking about the 1960s. I was hit with a stick and reflecting on it now if it was outlawed then it wouldn’t have broken the law.”
(Image: ITV)
He then asked TV guest Rebecca Wilcox: “Is that one of the reasons with that knock-on effect, it would make parents them stop and think if this ban was introduced?”
Rebecca is a journalist and daughter of Childline founder Miriam Wilcox.
She then replied: “It’s been proven if you make it illegal, it’s a form of education, it’s not about criminalising parents, but smacking has a negative impact on mental health all the way through childhood and adolescence.
“We need to evolve out of violence, you should not be smacking, discipline means teaching. It is not about punishment. We do not want to create fear.”
(Image: mirror.co.uk)
This comes after GMB viewers were stunned by Richard’s “brutal” interview skills when chatting to John Barrowman on Tuesday (February 22).
In 2021, John was accused of exposing himself when working on the set of Doctor Who, which led Richard to begin with: “A lot of people in this country would have assumed your career was over.
“When all the reports came out of this party trick you used to do, which is basically exposing yourself to colleagues which you thought was very funny at the time, and all this came out – and it would seem to many of us that that kind of sunk your career.
“And yet, here we are talking about brand new projects. How did you turn it around?”
Good Morning Britain airs weekdays at 6am on ITV
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
