EVERY week Citizen Smith bangs on about the decay of morals and the downward spiral of society's values and then he points a mickey-taking finger at front-line jobs such as the police and claims they should not be doing the job if they can't deal with stress.

The real point is, that there is much more stress for everybody, whatever their occupation, to deal with in the late 1990s than there ever was.

You start the moment you leave the safety of your own home to go to work with the thought: Is my car still parked outside? Autocrime is a malaise which seems to grow year on year. If you're lucky and your car is still where you left it, how about a good dose of road rage just to get you into shape before walking into the office ready to face another day. People's respect for others, their property, their privacy, are all steadily being eroded by a society which appears to be going from bad to worse.

I personally believe a lot of the responsibility for the lowering of values is entirely the fault of cheap, sensationalist tabloid newspapers. Citizen Smith is wide of the mark this time.

In Britain in 1996 just how many people would want, in their heart of hearts, to be a police officer.

J Holden,

Oswaldtwistle

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.