It is worrying that Lord Falconer should believe that: ‘We are a country that plays by the rules’ (see [2008] Gazette, 26 June, 16). Many of us have long suspected that New Labour inhabits a different planet from the rest of the country and his comment tends to reinforce that view.

A depressingly large proportion of the population has a criminal record, but generally his opinion is a triumph of wishful thinking over everyday experience. Certainly, there are people who play by the rules, but a great many more live their lives according to what they can get away with, without any well-developed concept of right and wrong. That is at the root of so many of the problems in our society.