Sedated, stoned or stupefied?

This is about the time when I think about what should be in my next column. And I am spoilt for choice - the pace of reform, and events, is outstripping this commentator's ability to respond. So I am not blogging or writing about the Education Bill, free schools, or the national curriculum. Instead I have picked up on the statistic, reported at the British Psychological Society, that 650,000 children aged between eight and 13 were prescribed Ritalin or a similar drug last year, at a cost of £200 each. My reading of the DFE statistics is that there are 3,351,730 childern in this age group - including, oddly, 130 children aged 12 or 13 in primary schools, and 22,930 children aged eight or nine in secondary schools - so very nearly one child in five in this age group is being prescribed a psychotropic drug commonly called in the tabloid press a 'chemical cosh', a seven-fold incresae since 1997. That seems worth writing about.