So this is it. Unicef has finally pronounced on childcare and its verdict is damning. Mothers who tear their babies from their breasts, squeeze themselves back into a suit and return to work before their darlings are old enough to say “Mummy stay home” are in danger of damaging their child for life.

While nurseries lined with cots and feeding charts may not be quite as cruel as Romanian orphanages, they are harming babies under 2 who need one-to-one contact with an adult to thrive.

Unicef's league table ranks countries by the type of care that they provide for young children in “their most formative years” and Britain languishes near the bottom half. The report suggests that babies need constant love as a foundation for intellectual as well as emotional development, that stress (presumably from being separated from their mothers) can disrupt their developing brain and that children's early interaction with their family establishes “the patterns of neural connections and chemical balances” that profoundly influence what they will become.

The guilt. Mothers clutching their lattes as they rush from school to work still absent-mindedly holding their child's book bag will feel sick as they watch the stay-at-home mothers cruising back on their son's scooter, baby strapped to their front. Have they disadvantaged their children by going back too soon? Will their daughter go to university after being left with a series of Bulgarian au pairs? Will their child ever be invited on playdates if they never go to those coffee mornings with the other mothers? Do they really need the money so much that they have sacrificed their son's wellbeing for a bigger house and mortgage?

The last time Unicef produced a report into children's happiness it didn't take long for British parents to begin flagellating themselves with their daughters' skipping ropes. This country came at the bottom of the happiness league. The Archbishop of Canterbury said it was shocking, a new post of children's commissioner was created, and children's writers weighed in. It didn't matter that the statistics were skewed, that North Korean children, when asked by their cane-wielding teacher, are bound to say that they are content and that the Americans refused to add in any statistics on teenage pregnancies. British mothers are tortured about how to bring up their children. This country tops the world league in childcare manuals.

The latest Unicef report says that more than half of all British mothers now go back to work when their child is under 1 but the Government's statistics show that it is just under half and that the number of women in full-time work is actually dropping. Many employees are now taking advantage of a year-long maternity leave and flexitime to diversify or modify their careers so they can spend more time making cupcakes with their families. There has been a 40 per cent drop in women in senior management roles at UK FTSE 350 companies in the past five years and the majority of working women are part-time.

Middle-class children don't suffer from a moderate amount of high-quality childcare, whether they are reading The Gruffalo with an au pair, a nanny, a grandmother or in a nursery. It is their mothers who become anxious, racked by remorse at leaving their babies with someone who soon knows more about their shoe size and their preference for sweetcorn-and-honey sandwiches. Mothers leave strict instructions about only feeding their little ones organic beetroot compotes and not watching DVDs. But even if their children do inexplicably seem to prefer pies to polenta and know all the lyrics for Bob the Builder, the statistics show that as long as they were looked after by loving adults, they will not be psychologically harmed.

There has never been a golden age of childcare. Even in the 1950s when the majority of women saw being a wife and mother as their primary role, most were distracted by a constant round of shopping, washing and cooking.

The real problem, as the report admits after a great many pages, concerns children from poorer backgrounds who may already be disadvantaged. These children, particularly those who have English as a second language or who come from deprived homes, are likely to thrive if they integrate with other children from the age of 3, which is why so many resources have been poured into the Sure Start programme for pre-school children.

However, for children below that age the picture is very different. For those who attend large, underprovided nurseries the result is likely to be slower development and underachievement at school. A study of children using government-funded childcare in the UK showed that those in “group care” before the age of 3 tended to show higher levels of antisocial behaviour at school.

The Australian psychologist Steve Biddulph suggested last year that the best nurseries could cater for the needs of the very young but that the worst were “negligent, frightening and bleak, a nightmare of bewildered loneliness that was heartbreaking to watch”. A recent Ofsted report backed his findings, stating that more than half of the childminders and nurseries in some London boroughs were “inadequate”, with many staff being unqualified and uncommitted.

So this report is more valuable to the Government than to anxious middle-class parents who obsessively vet their nurseries and nannies. Yesterday ministers announced reforms to the welfare state that will encourage mothers with children over the age of 1 to “prepare” for the job market.

Yet it is clear that there is little point in forcing the least well-off mothers back into work if their baby is going to be looked after by another poorly paid worker in charge of several babies. Either the Government must help these mothers to recognise that looking after their young children is a serious job or they must provide these children from deprived backgrounds with highly skilled, well-paid nursery teachers who can help to improve their chances in life not damage them.

Meanwhile, all those earnest, well-meaning, nervous middle-class mothers should relax. The most significant Unicef research shows that the happiest mothers create the most contented children; so whatever decision you make, stop worrying and your child will be fine.

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