'MUM, look, William kicked me in the knee with his football studs." "Mum, Charlie tried to strangle me." "Muuuu-m, Patrick jumped on top of me and banged my head on the floor."

Three days into half term week and we've already had at least two attempted murders one near strangulation and several cases of grievous bodily harm in our house. On the whole, I leave the boys to it and don't intervene unless there is blood spurting from a major artery.

Usually, they sort it out amongst themselves. "Nothing to worry about, they're just working on their social skills," I tell my mother when she phones and wonders what all that banging and crashing is in the background.

She should know, my brothers and sisters and I (all best friends now) used to beat the living daylights out of each other on a regular basis, culminating in agonising Chinese burns championships at the end of the week. To me, this sort of behaviour is normal; part of family life.

But it seems to have come as a shock to academics at Glasgow University who, after extensive research, announced this week that - shock, horror - siblings are violent toward one another.

Four fifths of youngsters, they concluded, attacked their brothers and sisters. And more than half the children in the study had punched or tried to strangle siblings.

"We had no idea the levels of sibling violence would be so high," said one of the authors of the report. Which makes me think that the academics involved are all only children who don't have a clue about the subtleties of social interaction. Either that, or they'll all from another planet.

MY passport application for our seven-week-old baby was turned down this week because the photograph was unsuitable. The problem, the lady in the post office said, was that my hands were in the picture and I was in the background, which is supposed to be plain white. "But he's only a few weeks old, I have to hold him." Her answer? "We advise people to cover themselves in a white blanket." No, she wasn't joking. The Passport Office confirmed the advice, explaining nothing must be allowed to detract from the child's face. It clearly hasn't occurred to them that in a few years he will look totally different anyway. And every time he shows his passport photograph, there, looming in the background, will be his mother - a ridiculously eerie figure draped in white. Will he ever forgive me?

THE BBC's list of Great Britons, voted by viewers, includes politicians, inventors, writers, explorers and celebrities. But if we truly want to recognise all those people who have made Britain great, shouldn't there also be a place for the ordinary man and woman, such as those who struggled to put bread on the table for their families during the depression of the Thirties or who fought on the frontline during two world wars? I can't think of a greater, and more lasting, contribution to society than raising and nurturing happy, well-balanced children who will go on to pass the love, care and values they have grown up with down through the generations. Ordinary people can be extraordinary too.