Kirstie Allsopp has slammed parents who let their children use iPads at the dinner table, saying ‘meal times are for talking’.
The London-born Location Location Location host, 53, took to X (formerly Twitter) on Saturday to vent her frustration after witnessing a five-year-old glued to a screen while eating breakfast at a hotel in Switzerland.
Kirstie, never one to shy away from a controversial opinion, branded it ‘damaging’ and ‘really bad’ for children’s development.
She wrote: ‘I’m staying in a hotel in Switzerland, just had breakfast next to an English couple with one child, probably aged five, he ate his breakfast watching an iPad on the table in front of him.
‘I know this topic is a dangerous one but when are people going to wake up to how wrong this is?’
The mother-of-two, who has 19-year-old, Bay Atlas and 17-year-old Oscar Hercules, hammered home her point in another series of tweets.
She said: ‘We know now that this is really bad for children’s language and social development.
‘Meal times are for talking. Kids cannot learn the skills they need to navigate the world via an iPad and if you can’t even get through a meal cooked by someone else, in a relaxed environment, then the challenges you face later are going to come as a big shock.’
The tweet, which racked up nearly five million views, sparked a fierce parenting debate with some rushing to the comments to say it’s a way to keep children quiet during mealtimes, so they don’t disturb other diners.
One person wrote: ‘The kid is 4. What they going to talk about over Breakfast? The economy?’
To which Kirstie replied: ‘Seriously, this is perhaps the most worrying tweet I have had today. If people do not understand the importance of engaging children in conversation we are truly screwed.’
Another said: ‘My grandson has ADHD, if he wasn’t allowed to watch an iPad whilst eating out my daughter and son-in-law would never be able to eat out which they hardly do anyway.
‘It’s the only way he’ll sit still, he also has this problem at school so is forever being sent out of the classroom, he has just turned five so maybe you should walk in some of the parent shoes before being so judgemental. You have no idea if that child had problems or not so it is you who is wrong.’
Kristie replied: ‘Bonkers, just bonkers. Try googling ‘screens and ADHD kids’ and seeing what it says.’
Another added: ‘Kirsty, I have to say, I expected better from you. How can you see one situation, one time, of a family on holiday and judge them for letting their kid watch a tablet.
‘Maybe the child has a disability/anxiety/maybe it’s their reward, maybe watching something educational?
‘Or maybe it’s just Peppa Pig or a violent cartoon, but how can you, seriously, take a collective assessment that eating a meal in peace for once, is somehow the subject of vilification. I hope you realise that it’s the same brigade as ‘don’t play too many video games or watch too much tv’ in the 90’s. Technology has changed fast & so should you.’
A fourth added: ‘You could have just minded your own business and enjoyed your own breakfast.’
However, some people praised the TV star for speaking out, saying children lesrn to interact in social settings away from screens.
One person said: ‘Parents who give iPads is teaching all the wrong things and laying the groundwork for trouble later.
‘Kids should not be constantly entertained with gadgets. It’s a family meal – no devices. If your child needs an iPad at the table to behave ‘well’ as a parent you have already started failing.’
Another said: ‘I find it sad because growing up being at social occasions with grown ups is how you learn to interact with others. It would be quite so bad if they were reading Kindle or a documentary, but it’s mostly inane youtube content.’
Someone else added: ‘Kirstie you are 1000% correct that this is pathetic. Anyone who says otherwise will find out how destructive screen time is for children. If your kids can’t sit at a table without a device they shouldn’t be there.’
Kirstie concluded: ‘Thank you so much to all those who understood my sadness at seeing a little boy not being engaged with by his parents in a lovely place, on a sunny Saturday. They grow up so fast, we have so few chances to guide them and screens can be so damaging. Talking to kids is everything.’
This isn’t the first time Kirsty has expressed her frustration over gadgets. The TV star has a long-standing feud with screens, famously admitting back in 2018 that she once smashed her children’s iPads in a moment of sheer frustration.
The presenter shared the revelation during an appearance on The Jeremy Vine Show, saying she damaged the devices after her children failed to stick to her rules on screen time. She was soon inundated with criticism from fellow parents on social media.
The Channel 4 presenter, who is married to Ben Andersen, admitted it was the first time she had discussed her drastic disciplining tactic. Explaining that they hadn’t followed her rules as to when and how they could use their tablets, she confessed to smashing them against a table leg as her children watched on in horror.
However not everyone agreed with her approach to discipline, with many branding the move a ‘waste’ on Twitter, arguing that they could have been donated them to less well-off families, and that her sons would not learn to ‘value their things’.
Kirstie said: ‘This is the first time I’ve said this publicly. In June I smashed my kids’ iPads, not in a violent way. I actually banged them on the table leg.’
She added: ‘There is a game called Fortnite and another called PUBG and I decided -we had made all sorts of rules and all sorts of times when we said you can’t play them and all those rules got broken and in the end I said: ‘Right that is it, I have to physically [break them].’ It was remarkably easy. I didn’t intend to speak about it but it’s come up now.’
Imitating how she would have broken them, Jeremy added: ‘I would have loved to do that – did you confess that you did it?’, while Kirstie replied: ‘They saw me do it’.
Questioning her, Storm Huntley, who appears on the show alongside Vine, asked: ‘What about the computers and the smart phones- they have millions of gadgets?’. with Kirstie replying: ‘They don’t have smartphones’.
But many Twitter users slammed her move, with one parent writing: ‘Nice to be so well off that you can do this. Why not confiscate them or donate them to a children’s hospice?’.
Others agreed, arguing that most parents wouldn’t be able to relate to this technique due to their financial position.
‘Deliberately breaking something expensive out of spite is a luxury few of us would want to afford, however well off,’ another added.
Suggesting Kirstie should have donated the items, one woman wrote: ‘I agree with taking them away but donating them to people who can’t afford to be so frivolous might have driven home a better message.’
And others admitted Kirstie’s confession had made them cross, with one woman writing: ‘Destruction tends to come from a place of privilege. This made me really cross’, and another adding: ‘I agree.
‘I wonder if it also sends out the wrong message re respect for others’ property. Tbh tho, parenting is often a trial & error thing.’
Branding it wasteful, one user tweeted: ‘I am glad she has enough money to not worry about smashing up expensive items’.
Meanwhile, others questioned whether she couldn’t have found another solution, with one writing: ‘Shows the wasteful core attitude of Kirstie in a position to destroy something that someone else could have benefitted with a little more thought a better solution could have resulted.’
Questioning whether it was a good example to set, one parent tweeted: ‘Good parenting would involve the children doing as they’re told with out having an hissy fit and breaking things, hey kids, if you don’t get want you want smash stuff up.’
Arguing that simply removing the items would have been more effective, another wrote: ‘This has annoyed me, I couldn’t afford to smash my kids tablets and just replace, what does that reach them about the value of things? Surely just removing them is the more sensible option?’.
But others were more understanding, arguing that parents should be less judgmental.
‘Being judgemental about another parent’s attitude towards maintaining a healthy relationship with their own kids is what? think she must have been at the end of her tether & done something desperate to regain control The punishment must’ve fitted the crime’, another argued.
Admitting they themselves had been pushed to the limit, one father wrote: ‘Who hasn’t been close to this? Never mind, we’re being pushed to the brink daily!’.
And others even shared their own similar experiences. ‘My mum once through mine and my sister’s comics on a coal fire for the same reason …60’s equivalent!’ a woman wrote.
Replying to a man defending her move, Kirstie later tweeted: ‘Thank you very much, in life everyone needs to occasionally know there are limits. If you never learn that you are lost.’
