My husband and I took our children, aged seven and five, for dinner at a pizza restaurant in Paris recently. We’d spent the day climbing the Eiffel Tower and taking photographs of the skyline, so spirits were high – but the meal was ruined by some obnoxiously bad behaviour. Not from our kids (they were happily focused on their pizza margheritas) but by the petulant 60-something British woman at the next table.

First, she simply shot death stares at us. Then, just as our desserts arrived, she said loudly to the man opposite her: ‘The only problem with this restaurant is that there are so many children.’ Maybe I should have remonstrated, but since becoming a parent I’ve learnt that the best way to deal with tantrums is to ignore them.

It's not the first time I’ve heard that opinion. This week the owner of a coffee shop hit back at critics who called for a boycott of his cafe, which has a no children under 12 policy. Bob Higginson, owner of ocean liner-themed coffee shop, The Chart Room in Brixham, Devon, argued that it was designed for people to experience the 'opulence and splendour of early steamship travel without distraction'.

And he's not alone. Ever since Donald Trump, a father of five, threw a mother and baby out of one of his rallies last August after the child started wailing, it’s been a question asked on both sides of the Atlantic: should some public spaces be strictly adult-only? Not the terrace of a cheap pizza joint at 7pm, I’d argue.