TRUST a nanny-minded government - and one rediscovering its old socialist instinct to splurge on spending - to come up with the idea of paying grandparents to mind their own grandchildren.

Ostensibly, it's all part of a drive to enable mothers to return to work - though goodness knows where the jobs are to be found when one of the government's top economic advisers is now maintaining that, to curb inflation, the country needs another half million on the dole.

And, true, part of the plan is to make parents happy about leaving their children with family members they know and trust instead of with strangers.

It's especially relevant after the recent case of a baby being killed by a woman who, despite being an ex-prostitute and having three of her own children adopted, was able to register as childminder.

But, for goodness sake, this plan allows for mothers to claim up to £105 a week for childcare costs.

And since this subsidy is expected to turn some 50,000 grannies into paid, official childminders, you don't need a calculator to reckon up that the taxpayer is going to be hit by a leap of hundreds of millions of pounds in the booming welfare bill the government keeps saying it will cut.

Just why should the state pay families for doing a job that's their responsibility in the first place - and something which thousands of unpaid grandparents already happily accept anyway?

Besides which, what's up with young mums staying at home to look after their kids like they used to do?

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.