Esther Ghey is turning mourning into helping young people and we salute her
It would be hard to find someone braver or more inspiring than Esther Ghey. Or anyone more determined to turn her own grief into a force for good.
Weeks after looking the teenage killers of her daughter, Brianna, in the eyes, Esther is working tirelessly to help other children feel better about themselves.
No one would have blamed Esther if she had turned in on herself to mourn her overwhelming loss. Instead she is campaigning to get mindfulness on the national curriculum.
Teaching the technique to children from a young age can give them coping strategies to deal with the rigours of modern life, and equip them to become happier and healthier adults.
Esther does not know whether the mindfulness she has practised for the past eight years would have saved Brianna. She does believe it might have made her daughter less susceptible to an eating disorder and self-harm.
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Mindfulness teaches children not to dwell on the past or be anxious about the future, but to keep their focus on the here and now.
Lessons in schools are now funded by charitable giving, but Esther wants to see them rolled out nationwide with Government help.
It could pay for itself by reducing the need for antidepressants or mental health treatment in later life. And perhaps go some way to eliminating the hatred which led to Brianna’s horrific murder.
We salute Esther’s courage. And urge ministers to embrace this campaign to show her that Brianna did not die in vain.
War on racism
Many more schools could do with the kind of visionary approach that courageous Esther Ghey is championing.
Shocking figures show 50 pupils are sent home a day for racist language and behaviour they learned off the internet while isolated during Covid lockdowns.
But experts say exclusion is not the answer. Dealing with the root cause of racism is. And that’s a job for both schools and government.
That means anti-racism teacher training to challenge prejudice and ministers doing more to ensure social media providers and messaging services are properly policed.
The new Online Safety Act is a welcome first step in stopping children accessing harmful content. But it does not go far enough. More powers are needed to force platforms to take racist posts down as soon as they are found.
Going for gold
If you fancy shacking up in Paris for July’s Olympics, Airbnb can offer you a shed with only a sink to wash in for a mere £507 a night.
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But if you want to splash out, there’s a one-bed outhouse with shower for more than £16,000 for two-and-a-bit weeks.
With such in-Seine prices it won’t be just the athletes striking gold.
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