OK, the world has officially gone bonkers. It seems we actually can’t do anything anymore without ‘elf and safety poking its increasingly irritating nose in somewhere along the way.

As of this week, Royal Mail has banned its posties from delivering in Doncaster when it’s raining after a postman slipped on a wet, mossy pavement and broke his shoulder.

Now, I am not belittling the serious injury this poor fellow received and I wish him all the best in his recovery.

Nor am I knocking Royal Mail for attempting to protect the interests of its staff. But, come on people, does it need to go so far as to regard wet pavements so dangerous that they are out of bounds?

To be fair to Royal Mail, their beef was not simply the fact the pavements were wet, but more the weather coupled with the condition of them.

They have promised normal service will be resumed once repairs have been carried out. However, I still ask, what is life without a little risk?

It seems a condition of this world we currently live in that we have abandoned this wonderful intuitive ability called ‘common sense’.

Yes, it is more abundant in some than others, but we need to be given a chance to exercise it and learn from our experiences in order to nurture it or, I fear, it could disappear all together.

All too often we hear of things which would have been perfectly acceptable not that long ago that are now deemed an abominable hazard.

I back up my statement with the following examples – irons removed from caravan parks because users could get burned, schools being ordered to carry out risk assessments before serving hot tea at fetes and candles on a toddler’s birthday cake being lit in a car park in case they burn the venue down.

Sometimes, it feels like “health and safety” is a convenient excuse not to do something.

People don’t want to get involved “in case” anything happens.

I’m not saying we should all start running around with scissors and giving boxes of matches to small children, but I believe people should be treated as the intelligent beings they are and given the chance to exercise measured risk.

After all, we have survived on this planet quite successfully for thousands of years without clipboardcarrying folks in high-viz jackets.

And if someone wants to do something really stupid, they’ll do it anyway, regardless of the barriers, warnings or brightly coloured flashing lights in place.