On the contrary, the elevation of a bunch of wringing-wet liberals to the commanding heights of policy advice is evidence that the rights of a criminal minority of young people are being raised above those of the law-abiding majority and that is not progress at all.

If the views of Sir Al and his fellow travellers had been in force at the time, the boys who  murdered little James Bulger would have gone unpunished on grounds of their tender years. What signal would that have sent out to other violent youngsters across the land?

In a throwaway observation the commissioners noted: “Child­ren feel increasingly unsafe in their local area, with one in four concerned about violence, crime and weapons.”

That much is certainly true. But who do the commissioners think is doing all the stabbing and mugging? Pensioners? Police? Wakey, wakey, chaps.

It is the damaged offspring of irresponsible and absent parents who are terrorising their peer group. So far this year, they have murdered more than a dozen young people in London alone and injured many more.

The way to protect children is to intervene hard and early in such families, not let them persecute neighbours.

Sir Al (a “down with the kids” name, I think you’ll agree) is an archetypal Sixties liberal who supposes he is standing up for a down­trodden minority. But times have moved on. The down­­trodden minority is in the vanguard of those calling for tougher police action against youth gangs.

Several thousand young people and their parents, mainly from the Afro-Caribbean community, marched through central London on Saturday in protest against the gun and knife crime afflicting their neighbourhoods.

They want more stop and search and tougher restraints on the ­activities of lawless youths so that their daughters and sons can go out without running the severe risk of being gunned down or getting a knife between the shoulder blades.

So do the overwhelming majority of people in Britain, young and old alike, whose lives are blighted by the hollow-eyed, unloved youths who congregate at night on street corners, who vandalise phone boxes and bus shelters, take drugs, commit robberies, steal from shops and carry knives.

Certainly society could be doing more to help such youths rise above their terrible up­bringing but its first duty is to protect the law-abiding from their baleful influence.

In a free society, nobody should begrudge the likes of Sir Al Aynsley-Green having his say but it is outrageous that he should be preaching feeble, discredited moral relativism at taxpayers’ expense as the official voice of wisdom on all matters pertaining to childhood.

The Government ministers who, despite belonging to an administration pledged to be “tough on crime”, appointed Sir Al should hang their heads in shame (that’s you, Ruth Kelly).

How are we supposed to believe that Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is sincere when she calls for the police to get “in the faces” of young thugs when it uses taxpayers’ money to elevate Sir Al’s entirely contrary message?

Stable families and communities and zero tolerance of violence and vandalism are the keys to returning Britain to an age where children could play outside in safety.

Instead this Government has subsidised family break-up via its welfare policies, shattered community cohesion via uncontrolled imm­i­gration and allowed moral cowards to dictate terms of trade on punishment.

For millions of children, growing up in Britain today has more in common with Lord Of The Flies than it does with Swallows And Amazons. Even the bus journey home from school is fraught with danger.

The prime cause of this de­grad­ation of young lives is the failure of adults to live up to their responsibilities to civilise and intervene, not some perverse desire to criminalise youngsters unfairly. Sir Al is absolutely and unforgivably wrong. He should be removed from his post forthwith.