So hurry down the chimney tonight...

After several discussions over the festive period with certain family members, most of which were held over several pints of ale, we are yet to come to a conclusion with regards to one of life's eternal questions..."When and how should a child be made aware that Santa Claus doesn't exist?"

To bring you all up to date, several theories have been batted about so far and even some serious suggestions, believe it or not. A common age that keeps being brought up is 7. At 7 you have been at school for 2 years, have made the break out of reception and free playtime milk and are firmly on course to learning joined up writing, pasta art and your 9 times table, which lets face it are all the life skills you will need to cope with learning that Mr Claus isn't real. By the age of 7 you have lost that facade of innocence that allows children to repeat the rude word their Grandad said when he stubbed his toe and be found cute and adorable. It has been crushed out of you by the realisation that you have at the very least 10 more years of school, homework, detentions, playground politics, 'see me' comments and lumpy mashed potato before you can start making something of your life.

Equally, by the time the child gets to 8 or 9 shockingly, they are only 1 or 2 years away from going to High school. High school leads to Teenagers which as we all know, leads to Hoodies, weed and ASBO'S. 8 or 9 is also the age where you realise that belief in Ol'Kringle is inextricably linked with the quality and indeed quantity of the presents that you receive. At this age the more switched on kids have seen the episode of The Simpson's that deals with the existence of Santa Claus, or some such TV programme and have continued the pretence in order to make the most of his bounty. It wont be until they hit High School or a year before, where it becomes 'uncool' to believe in St Nick that they give up the charade and call you down.

So, we have established the optimum age to disclose the lie you have been telling your child for all of their short life. But hang on, there is a worry here, something we haven't taken into account. What if the child finds out before you tell it? His (for the sake of this argument, the child is male) whole life you have been telling him not to lie or cheat, whilst at the same time continuing to insult his intelligence year in year out at Christmas, Easter and every time one of his teeth falls out. Oh the irony!! No wonder we have bred a generation of Hooligans. Myself, I was told when I was 6 by my parents whilst I was still young enough for it to hurt, but not old enough to associate the realisation with my parents telling me lies every Christmas. Had I been older however, it would almost certainly have been different. If they had waited a couple more years before they either told me or I found out through the Box, there would have been hell to pay...

"So you are telling me, Mummy dearest, that in actual fact a fat old man wearing red pyjamas with a penchant for having small children sit on his knee pleading their case as to whether they have been a naughty boy or not, does not creep into our house either via the chimney or as smoke that passes through the letterbox and dish out the huge mounds of presents that you have actually been buying me because you feel guilty for lying to me my whole life? So I assume the fairy that builds castles out of my teeth in exchange for a 50 pence piece's and the giant bunny who shits Easter eggs all over the lawn every spring are out of the window as well?!?!?!?!" I would of course be livid, as would any child, so timing is crucial.

The next question is, how? How do you tell them? The best suggestion I have heard so far (apart from the ethnic cleansing of all make believe children's annual characters by some evil tyrant (if you want to indoctrinate your child further then make the bad guy something that will reflect on him in later life; Graham Norton, Gordon Brown and Jim Davidson for example, would ensure that you child grows up to be a Heterosexual, ethnically friendly Tory)) is 'The Car Accident'. The Reindeer are tired after a hard Christmas of flying, the global population of children is increasing and Rudolph is getting on a bit. Santa has dropped them off at home and is the designated driver for the annual Make Believe Christmas Party and has picked up his good friends, the Tooth fairy and Easter Bunny. On route, they are all having a sing song, with the Bunny providing some chocolate snacks and the tooth fairy paying for the red bull at the service station with a big stack of 50 pence pieces. From nowhere an 18 wheeler full of Petrol driven by the Bogeyman ploughs into Santa's car, killing the lot of them in a blazing inferno. This achieves two things - No more midnight calls to check under the bed and in the wardrobe for signs of the Bogeyman, as 'no one could have escaped that crash son' and most importantly in a kind of Ocean Finance style lie; it cancels out all of the little lies you told your son and replaces it with one big one. Here's hoping your son doesn't cotton on until he is old enough to realise the irony in this and think kindly of you for creating such a humorous story. Otherwise he is going to hate your guts. And rightly so.

I suppose one thing is fairly obvious in all of this. Belief in these characters is linked to innocence and naivety, a quality that soon disappears from our children these days to be replaced by Hood's and WkD drinks on a park bench. If you let it take its natural course, I assume the idea of a rabbit that not only defecates chocolate, but does it in egg form as well, would be the first to go, closely followed by the Tooth Fairies dental turrets. Santa will always be the last one to go, and whilst he is perhaps the strangest and possibly most disturbing idea of them all, his death will also see the death of your young, smiling happy child and will be the dawn and herald of the terrible teens.