I got same tough love as 14-year-old Stockport rioter handed in by parents when I broke the law

Mirror columnist Polly Hudson's mum was prepared to call the police on her 10-year-old daughter to teach her a hard lesson. Now a mum herself, Polly would do exactly the same thing to her 10-year-old son

When my friend’s son turned 13, she started ringing her mum almost every day. To apologise. Profusely.

Faced with parenting a teenager herself, a million childhood memories were suddenly reframed, decisions she’d railed against and never understood now made perfect sense, and she was grateful for them.

There’s a 14-year-old boy out there who may one day feel the same. His mum and dad saw him on social media taking part in the Stockport riots and marched him straight down to the police station.

The director of public ­prosecutions gave some ­indication of how angry they’d been with him by revealing that, “We took the decision that the wrath that had been visited on that child by his parents was more effective than anything the ­criminal justice system could deliver.”

There are two types of parents in the world: those who do this sort of thing, and those who blindly protect their kids, refusing to believe they could ever do anything wrong, making excuses even when faced with irrefutable evidence. I was desperate for the latter while growing up, mostly because I had the former.

Marching me to the authorities to face the consequences of my actions is not just what my parents probably would have done, it’s what they actually did.

When I was about 10, I stole a chocolate bar from the local shop. A KitKat. Master criminal that I was, I’d just been moaning loudly about having spent all my pocket money, and hid the evidence by chucking the wrapper in the kitchen bin, right on the top, where it was discovered roughly 12 seconds later. When my mum asked where I’d got the KitKat, I tried to say that I’d found it, but I’m as bad at lying as I am at covering my dastardly tracks so she wasn’t fooled for a second.

I’ve never thought until now how embarrassing it must have been for her – she knew the owner of the shop, I went to school with his son – but she took me straight back there anyway.

She asked the guy if he wanted to call the police, but luckily he said he didn’t think that was necessary.

It was too late to return the stolen goodie, so instead my mum insisted I would pay him back with my pocket money. I was so mortified, I still feel ashamed when I see a KitKat to this day.

I was also outraged . How could my mum humiliate me like this? Why couldn’t she just tell me off and that be the end of it? I’d already learned my lesson! I was absolutely furious about her horrible, mean parenting. And now, with my own child, who has just turned 10, I would definitely do exactly the same.

Covering up for your kid isn’t doing them any favours, because the rest of the world won’t when they’re out there on their own. Denying their faults, their mistakes, doesn’t make them disappear, it gives them space to grow and thrive.

I’ll never know whether that was a Sliding Doors moment, and I might have embarked on a life of crime, instead of cats, if it wasn’t for my mum’s decision that day.

But I’m definitely thankful that when it came to the KitKat, she didn’t give me a break.