FORMER singer Coleen Nolan defended her actions today after she promised her son sex with a prostitute if he passed his GCSEs.

The mother-of-three caused a row after she told how 15-year-old Shane Jr could go on a sex trip to Amsterdam.

Her ex-husband, EastEnders star Shane Richie, said he was "disgusted and appalled" by her comments about their son on ITV1 daytime show, Loose Women.

The former Nolans singer, 40, also told the shocked audience she had given her fiance Ray Fensome permission to have a one-night stand during the proposed trip.

Today, she said she was amazed by the fuss but was annoyed by Miriam Stoppard's comments in today's Daily Mirror newspaper.

Stoppard said "the world's gone insane" and that Nolan seemed to be shirking her responsibilities to deliver sex education.

Nolan said: "I'm just shocked at the reaction of all of it. I just thought we'd come so far. The thing that got me most about that paper interview was the comment by Miriam Stoppard.

"She calls me an irresponsible parent - well, to me that's irresponsible journalism because she hasn't got any of the facts right.

"Shane Junior has been sexually active since he was 15. We have always had a fantastic open relationship as mother and son. We have talked about everything - mainly safe sex."

She said she would have been "very naive and stupid" if she had told him he was not allowed to have sex until he was 18 or married.

"He's 15 and will go out and do it. I agree with her (Miriam) that if he'd never had sex and I'd never discussed it, it would have been a very, very cheap way of getting rid of my responsibilities and saying, `Let her tell him what to do'.

"This whole thing came about because Shane is taking his GCSEs and I said if you do really well in them, I will pay for you, for a long weekend, to go anywhere you want to go.

"His first reaction was, `Mum, me and my mates have always wanted to go to Amsterdam to see the red light district'.

"I didn't say, `If you get five GCSEs, I'll send you to Amsterdam to sleep with a prostitute'."

Fantasy

She said her son wanted to go to Amsterdam because it was "every teenager's fantasy".

She added: "I'd be very naive to think, `Oh isn't it lovely that he wants to go to Amsterdam and see the sights' - I know exactly what sights he wants to see.

"He's started revising three hours every night. This child has gone from getting no GCSEs to eight A*s.

"We are very open about it - we talk about safe sex.

"If he planned to go on a trip to Ibiza everybody would have thought that was fine, even though he would probably have unprotected sex with lots of girls.

"Everyone thinks that's OK, but as soon as you mention prostitute and the words `paying for it', everyone is, like, `gasp'," she said.

But Richie, who split with Nolan in 1997 and has another younger son with her, said earlier: "I'm absolutely disgusted and appalled about what Coleen said on Loose Women.

"I can only think she said this for shock value, and I hope and assume it was said in total jest.

"No responsible parent would even think of such a thing - let alone state it.

"I can assure everyone that having passed his GCSEs - fingers crossed - Shane Jr will not be going to Amsterdam. I have bigger family plans."

Nolan stunned co-presenters and the audience on Tuesday by revealing that she had offered to finance the trip as a post-exams reward.

"I said, `Ray will have to go with you', and he said, `Well then, Ray might sleep with a prostitute too'.

"I said, `Oh, that's all right, it's only a prostitute'. I wouldn't throw away the father of my children and all that for the sake of lads being lads."

As the crowd gasped, she added: "As long as he comes back and tells me about it. I'm not joking, I'd love it. There's something a little bit kinky about me."

Is a sex trip suitable reward for exam success? Have your say.

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