Editorial – Who can we trust now?

CYNICISM grows apace. The conviction of a judge for deceiving a client into bequeathing money to her children, while she was practising as a solicitor, has put another nail in the coffin of respect for authority. There was a time when we suffered from a surfeit of deference. Those who were judged to be our betters â€â€ judges, lawyers, doctors, bankers, teachers, priests â€â€ were given elevated status. Status equals power, and power can corrupt. A few of those listed above fell far below the standards expected of them. After years, often decades, of covering up their wrongdoings were exposed.[private] This was as it should have been. However, there was also collateral damage in that an attitude arose among some that 'they're all at it'. It is the perfect excuse for those who wish to reject authority. Now it is common for doctors to be verbally abused by patients, for teachers to be challenged by parents who refuse to believe their child may not be an angel in school. Not to mention the treatment innocent priests may endure as a result of the crimes of a minority of colleagues, and the subsequent failings of the bishops. Ironically, one of the fears of the church authorities in relation to clerical child abuse was 'giving scandal' and therefore diminishing trust in the church. The scandal has been well and truly given, and not necessarily to churchgoers. Decent citizens are being sickened day in, day out by the failure of the establishment to deal with the gross anomalies that permeate our society. They are legion, but include the cutting of home help hours while health administrators sit pretty; the continuous targeting of the lower paid and those on social welfare for cuts, while former bankers and politicians enjoy obscenely inflated pensions; and now the failure to legislate on when and how a pregnant woman at serious risk to her life may legally be treated. This Government came to power bearing the hopes of all who voted for it that, in spite of the inevitable austerity, we would end up living in a fairer society. Now that the optics of the coach trip to the Park by the new ministers to receive their seals of office have long been forgotten, what else has been done to reduce waste and curb excess? The grubby little case of former Judge Perrin has nothing concrete to do with any of the foregoing, but it represents another strand lost from the unravelling web of social cohesion. When will we have a real republic?[/private]