Details are offered by guilt-racked witnesses. The noticing of a bump on his head. Jamie "skipping" after the boys when he was called by them in the car-park. Jamie being swung "over the boys' heads." Morsel after grim morsel of memory is tearfully presented by people, who could have been you or me, overwhelmed by a sense of remorse and shame for not having done anything. But these hapless people are merely at the frontline of our collective impotence when it comes to the care of children. And our collective guilt that we are neglecting them.

Something has gone wrong. Or perhaps it was never right in the first place. The fact that women can succeed in politics and business now, due to the revolution called feminism, actually means very little when for every Mary Robinson there is a Margaret Thatcher. Some say, ah yes, but Thatcher isn't a real woman. To me that is a mythical thing, a real woman. There are stupid women, strong women, women of genius, feeble women, cowardly women, caring and unfeeling women. There are stark staring mad women - just watch Thatcher now on television. And there are inspiring and compassionate women like Mary Robinson.

The point I am making is that gender does not dictate the sort of person you are, the values you hold. That is personal. But the values of the collective, the moral standards of a society, can be changed, through education and childcare. For the rearing and education of children is, quite simply, the shaping of our society to come.

Gross injustice

As a society, we used to split our education service down the middle, so that one half were educated with the emphasis on developing nurturing, caring skills. Since there was a gross injustice there, in that which way one was brought up was not related to one's own innate talents or abilities, but only whether one was a boy or a girl, the system needed to be changed.

Unfortunately, instead of keeping the institutions the way they were, and allowing the children, or their parents, to select which educational emphasis would suit each individual child, without reference to their sex, we abolished the emphasis on caring and homemaking and childrearing altogether.

We have dumped those values as a by-product of feminism, which is highly ironic. Success of the material world is now everyone's aim, with children coming along as inconveniences and obstacles to earning a living wage. How we value ourselves relates to our status, our earning power, and not whether we are sensitive and caring and loving to our children. "I'm just a housewife" is being heard more and more, and it is disastrous. For the children. For us, But I am not advocating the return to traditional gender stereotyping, quite simply because I believe I would be a marvellous carer and a sensitive, loving parent. I know it is a full time, demanding task. The fact that it is thankless and progressively being downgraded in our society, by both women and men, is appalling.

Valuable opportunity

The clause in our constitution which states that no mother should be obliged by economic necessity to work outside the home is one which has never been honoured. In recent times, there have been calls for its removal, most noticeably in the second Commission on the Status of Women's Report. But I believe to do so would be a tragedy.

I would support its enforcement, but propose an amendment, changing the word "mother" to "primary carer of children" or some such phrase, to allow the clause to give status to fathers who choose to give their lives to bringing up their children. And to reinforce the status of those women who are doing the childrearing at the moment, with little or no support from the State.

Something has to be done to make the education, nurturing and welfare of children the primary concern of all of us. Which means a radical shift, a revolution, in what we as adults value. Free, or at least tax-deductible crèches, with fully trained childminders. Small classrooms with better facilities. Wages for those who are bringing up our next generation. Free counselling for carers and children. I want to see the sort of society where a man is praised for giving up his career to care for his children, citing how he is delighted to meet the challenge of such a rewarding and valuable opportunity. But he won't do it unless he is paid for his trouble. And I don't blame him.

Feminism has succeeded in liberating individual women, giving them greater choices, and enriching and empowering them. But our values are not changing for the better at the same pace. After all, it was a woman, Gemma Hussey, who as Minister for Education cut the funding for remedial teachers - the teachers who have the task of rescuing those who have slipped by the wayside in our educational system, due to neglect, poverty, or other misfortunes; bringing them back on board, civilising and caring for them.

They are the sort of people, mostly women, who represent what good nurturing should mean. And the sort of children they deal with are those who are so out of touch with their feelings that they batter a five-year-old to death.