Letter: Demanding times for teenagers

Sir: Further to today's letter from Mrs E. F. Rolfe's and Patricia Finney's article on overseeing toddlers while shopping, some friends of ours were in the United States last year on holiday and 'lost' their two-year-old daughter in a busy, huge shopping centre.

As soon as the centre's security service was made aware of the incident, all its exits were closed and locked while security guards began a search of the place. The closing of the doors was done by a centrally operated locking system. No one was allowed out until our friends' child was found, which, fortunately, happened a few minutes later.

Isn't it time that some children's safety rules, similar to the American ones, were imposed on shopping centres, since parental attention can never be 100 per cent foolproof? These might include 'child lost' alarm buttons in each shop and prominently placed, easily readable posters that explain to parents the procedure to follow if they lose contact with their child.

Yours faithfully,

CLAUDE FIVEL-DEMORET

Croydon, Surrey

18 February