Ever thought of using your baby as a mop?

Trust the Japanese to come up with something as creative as this!

Baby: no longer useless

With global financial markets in turmoil parents looking in to firing their cleaners and using their babies as human mops.

Parents fed up of the take, take, take attitude of babies are turning them into human mops so they can learn a 'healthy work ethic' early by cleaning the floor as they crawl around.

The device is essentially a baby-grow with fluffy mop ends attached to clean up grime as a baby crawls around wooden or tiled floors.

In its sales pitch the advert reads: 'After the birth of a child there's always the temptation to say 'Yes, it's cute, but what can it do?'

'Until recently the answer was simply 'lie there and cry' but now babies can be put on the payroll, so to speak, almost as soon as they're born.

'Just dress your young one in Baby Mops and set him or her down on any hard wood or tile floor that needs cleaning.'

'You may at first need to get things started by calling to the infant from across the room, but pretty soon they'll be doing it by themselves.'

Hitting back at any possible criticism the advert adds: 'There's no child exploitation involved. The kid is doing what he does best anyway: crawling. But with Baby Mops he's also learning responsibility and a healthy work ethic.'

Japan is also the home of a roller cleaning device that can be strapped to a dog to clean the floor as it walks around.

-- The Metro