Liz Hurley is wrong - children shouldn't wear bikinis

Liz Hurley has come under fire this week for bringing out a range of bikinis for children.

The pint-sized pieces are aimed at children aged eight and below and offer the wearer the choice of ‘sweet frill details’, tie sides or leopard print material.

Call me old-fashioned, but why does a child need a bikini? It’s hardly like they need to worry about tan lines – they’re eight-years-old! What’s wrong with a cotton t-shirt, a swimming costume and a slick of sun tan lotion?

Bikinis are cumbersome devices – the straps dig in, the material rides up and down and you’re at risk of doing a Kate Middleton if you attempt anything vaguely sporty. It’s entirely impractical to put a child in clothing that will restrict their movements, as well as upping the dangers of them getting sunburn on their delicate tums.

It’s the adult-like element to the designs which makes my skin crawl

This isn’t about a lack of clothing: children can and should be able to run around beaches as naked as the day they were born. It’s the adult-like element to the designs which makes my skin crawl.

Dressing a child in adult-like fashions not only over-sexualises them, it teaches them the wrong messages about fashion and their bodies. These clothes aren’t practical: they are decorative. And it teaches young girls that this is their poolside role, fuelling their paranoia from an early age. You wouldn’t put your son in tight budgie-smugglers, so why deck your daughter out in a skimpy two-piece?

Liz Hurley – she of the safety pin/knickers on display/serial disobey-er of the ‘legs or cleavage’ rule – is the last person I’d want to dress my child. For a start, she wears so little clothing that I can only imagine her body is allergic to material, in which case she is hardly qualified to cut cloth.

Children don’t need celebrity fashion, they don’t need high heels, they don’t need make-up

There’s so much pressure on children to grow up fast nowadays – do we really need to start foisting adult fashions on them before they can spell their surnames? There’s plenty of time for them to fall off high heels, experiment with skirts that could pass as belts and generally dress like an extra from Band of Gold – that’s what your teen years are for. When you’re eight, all you need to worry about is where your next ice cream is coming from and how to build the best defensive moat for your sandcastle.

Children don’t need celebrity fashion, they don’t need high heels, they don’t need make-up. What they need is to have fun and be able to explore their boundaries without the added pressure of having to worry about what they look like.

There’s plenty of time for that when you start finding your first greys.