Children’s book author, Julia Donaldson, is under fire for the language used in her book, The Highway Rat.  

In it she writes ‘The highway rat grew horribly fat from eating up everyone’s dinner.’ This has been highlighted online by body image speaker Alex Light who says she won’t be reading that line to her son, even though she loves the author.  

I want to know what you think. Should children’s authors be more mindful about the language they use? Should we be combing through our best-loved fairy tales to make sure they’re not insulting or insensitive? Or is that all a bit OTT? They are only stories after all.  

Andrea was joiend by Children's book author, Benji Bennett, Entertainment journalist, Sarina Bellissimo, Katie Makk Host of The Opinions Matter Podcast, Aideen Finnegan, Presenter of Early Edition from the Irish times and Rebecca Horan, parenting podcaster and mother of 2.