ALL right - so Bolton MP Ruth Kelly has left herself open to allegations of hypocrisy about sending her son to a private school.

The Communities Secretary and former Education Minister was bound to cause a furore with her decision to opt out of her local state school in favour of a £15,000 a year private school. This is to help her son who has special needs, although her other children still attend the state school.

The knives are out, and there is no doubt that she has committed a cardinal, political sin in not practising in her private life what she insists on preaching to others in public.

Well, sorry, but I think she is doing the right thing.

She may have failed the political "test" with that particular decision, but she has succeeded as a parent.

Getting our children's education right is one of the most important aspects of parenting.

Most of us have limited choices. We select the best school we can - perhaps studying league tables, Ofsted reports or just talking to other parents - then we just hope we've got it right.

Some parents decide they will pay for their children's schooling; that is their right. Nor are they all necessarily on a minister's salary - some make big sacrifices to pay for this. The rest of us take on the state system with a mixture of trepidation and optimism, and, for many parents and children, the results are positive.

But sometimes a child has particular needs - special needs - that parents do not feel are being met by the system. This kind of provision is very patchy in schools around the country, sadly - thanks to politicians' decisions.

So, if they can, parents start to look for an alternative.

Ruth Kelly and her husband Derek Gadd have done this. It's not a decision they will have taken lightly, and she will have been fully aware of the repercussions. But, I suspect that she was never going to be swayed by public opinion on this one.

She will be a mother long after she is a politician, though, and this is all about what is best for her child.

Of course, this could prove costly politically for her. History is littered with the ruined careers of politicians who made personal decisions over professional probity.

But, oddly, such a high-profile case might just shine the spotlight on the difficulties faced by many parents of special needs youngsters in getting the right education for them.

And then who knows what might result.