Whatever happened to appointment viewing for children’s TV programmes like Blue Peter? - Sarah Todd

Anyway, as an aside, Purves was axed from the Crufts coverage a few years ago now after 41 years. At the time he presumed it was because of his advancing years.

Whatever the reason, it’s interesting - to this viewer at least - that well over four decades on from watching him on children’s television his face, name and voice are still so familiar.

In a rambling way, there is a point to make here. The children’s programmes of our generation had a lasting impact.

John Craven was synonymous with the daily news bulletin Newsround and while it is still shown, the token six minutes at 7.45am on the children’s digital channel CBBC is a far cry from the home-from-school slot of our day.

After 66 years Blue Peter will be moving online and no longer recorded live. Don’t ask what ‘moving online’ means - is it that the content is there if it’s clicked on? - but this sadly seems to be the direction that all children’s television is headed.

There is no doubting that on-demand viewing can be brilliant for us grown-ups. Rather than dashing around like headless chickens to catch a favourite programme, the ‘play’ button can be pressed when the fire is lit or the dog has been taken out.

But is structure not needed for children? Back in the day we all, and our parents, knew that we would be watching Blue Peter for 25 minutes at 5pm.

Reading, spellings, feeding guinea pigs or whatever we had going on, was worked around the children’s television schedule. Same on a Saturday morning. Televisions weren’t on as constant background noise, children sat slack-jawed not really engaging like they do with today’s constant re-runs. Sorry, going on a tangent, but Saturday mornings… We watched Noel Edmonds, Keith Chegwin and Maggie Philbin on Multi-Coloured Swap Shop. That was our telly for the weekend.

Later came Tiswas on ‘the other side’ of ITV, with Chris Tarrant, Sally James and Bob Carolgees alongside Spit the puppet dog.

None of these names have had to be looked up. They were part and parcel of pretty much everybody’s lives in a way that has been diluted and lost over the years.

Society has taken its eye off the ball to allow television to move out of the sitting room at a set time, with mother - or we had better say a parent to be politically correct - popping in and out.

The late Diana, Princess of Wales was reported as saying that she used to love nothing more than sitting on the sofa with her young sons watching Blue Peter as a family.

This horrible mother never let her children have televisions in their bedrooms. Back then they became a thing, with lazy parents putting on Disney type videos at bedtime rather than reading a story. We read our way through all the Famous Fives, Harry Potters and so-on.

The Son, now 21, has a dog called Spud - named all these years later after the main character of a series of books by John van de Ruit. Still worth, as a word to the wise, looking up for lads aged around 12 onwards.

It beggars belief how people just don’t seem to put two and two together and realise all this independent screen time is bad for children.

If kids are watching something while - to use the stereotype but jigger it - mum’s making tea in the kitchen next door she can hear and they can ask questions. It’s not like them stumbling across potentially frightening information (we had the Falklands and they now have a literal bombardment of conflicts) in isolation.

Of course, the clock can’t be turned back to the halcyon viewing schedules of these recollections. But surely the least any of us can ask is that politicians and media executives - suppose it’s no longer just categorised as television bosses - shoulder some responsibility.

When we are debating the future of the BBC and getting bees in our bonnets about the news, presenters and programmes being woke, we shouldn’t be selfish.

It’s not just about what we are watching, or turning off because it’s rubbish, it’s about the untold damage it could be doing to the next generation.