New Government Scheme - Child Licence

I'm currently doing a 7 week paediatrics firm, 2 weeks in I've come up with a fantastic idea. In order to have children one should first have to obtain a licence.

In the last 2 weeks I've seen some shocking things, I can't quite believe how some of the parents treat their children and I've just seen the tip of an exceedingly large iceberg. One young girl of about 10 was on the ward, she was covered in a strange, unidentifiable rash. Her hair was in an awful state, completely matted and literally swarming with nits it was desperate for a wash and comb. Unfortunately the back of her neck was the worst, the skin had peeled off and all that was left was a red raw patch of wet, sticky and inflamed gunk. It must have been so painful for her and nothing could be done to her hair, except cut it off because of the state of her neck. I felt so sorry for her, she was sweet, co-operative and very clever. Obviously the parents were nowhere to be seen on the ward. This girl had obviously had a problem for ages, yet only now had her parents even bothered to do anything - WHY? the poor thing winced in pain whenever anyone touched her, nobody could possibly have missed it, it was probably spotted at school before the parents even noticed! If parents don't want to look after their children properly then they shouldn't be allowed to have them!

Another girl, only a couple of months old was admitted with a cough, it wasn't a terribly bad cough, the consultant admitted her because her mother, an IV drug user, had just left her. The poor thing was coughing, the parents didn't give a fuck, the health visitor had taken the baby to doctors and he referred her for admission. These parents don't care about their children, it means they get a few more benefits to go and spend on drugs, they don't give a fuck about the welfare of the child. What sort of future does that poor little girl have? She'll probably go home, grow up with drug abusing mother and will probably turn out just the same. What a waste of a potential life.

My girlfriend who is currently teaching in a roughish comprehensive sees another side of these children, many of whom, at the age of 11 are writing in their schoolbooks that 'people how are 11 should smoke if they want', and god knows what else. These children aren't all stupid, the parents just fuck them up and don't help them at all.

I propose a simple solution whereby if you want to have a baby you must first apply for licence which would be granted if you meet certain criteria:
a) You're not a drug abuser
b) You've not a benefit cheating whore
c) You're over 18
d) You're a sensible person
e) You've got a job and will be able to cope financially with having a child (I suppose we could have a system where you can have 1 child if you're on benefits in the interests of fairness and all that)
f) You don't wear burberry/hoodies/other counterfeit designer clothing
g) You don't have an ASBO
h) You're not going to call your child after the last winner of celebrity big brother/your favourite brand of cider.
i) You're actually going to care for for your children
j) You're not going to sit your children in front of the TV all day and feed them turkey twizlers

Not only would this stop incompetent imbeciles from littering the country with children they don't care about it would save money on health care costs, save benefits and even reduce unemployment by proving jobs for people to assess potential parents. Seriously some people just aren't fit to be parents and it makes me sick to see the results of their neglect. I could never be a paediatrician for that reason alone.

Quite how we go about implementing such a system I'm not quite sure but that can be someone else's job, I'm just an ideas man.

If anyone else can suggest more criteria, please do. :)