TELEVISION presenter Esther Rantzen has spoken of her tears for tragic bullies' victim Elaine Swift and the need to stamp out bullying.

Writing exclusively for The Northern Echo, Ms Rantzen said the only memorial worthy of the Hartlepool teenager, who died on Monday from an overdose of painkillers, would be to eradicate bullying.

She wrote: "This is going on in every school in Britain. It must stop, before we lose more lives.

"I wish I had known Elaine Swift. She sounds a marvellous, courageous child. I weep for her family and friends - I know what pain they must be enduring.

"The only memorial worthy of such a child would be if bullying is eradicated, if we tackle it root and branch, wherever it occurs.

"We must all work together - young people, schools, families, police and social services, charities and the media.

"We must declare zero tolerance of bullying of all kinds, verbal, physical, racial, homophobic. It is all cruel, all anti-social, all utterly unacceptable."

Ms Rantzen, chairwoman of Childline, has campaigned against bullying for more than ten years and the charity recently held a conference about bullying, chaired by the Prime Minister's wife, Cherie Booth.

"Everyone present agreed that within schools the best policies involve 'peer support', that is active intervention by the young people themselves, in buddying schemes, mentoring partnerships, and so on," she wrote.

"Teachers need constantly to police the schemes to ensure they are being used properly; they should regularly institute anonymous questionnaires, to map the problem.

"Too often we heard at our conference of schools who blithely claimed 'We have no bullying in our school'.

"Bullying exists in every school - they are just turning a blind eye to it."

Ms Rantzen was writing after attending the launch of the Damilola Taylor Trust, in London, this week in memory of the youngster who was murdered by a gang of teenagers.

She said the community had created a recreation centre to take gangs off the street and that it was "the best memorial Damilola could have".

"I hope that the community in Hartlepool will unite to find a way to create a fitting memorial to Elaine," she wrote.

"If we can save children from fear, pain and death in the future, her life will not have been lost in vain."

To read the full transcript visit our website at thisisthenortheast.co.uk