When corruption around the globe is causing so much violence and havoc, it is essential that high standards in UK institutions are maintained.
Today’s world contains so much scam, sham and spam, that they have become almost norms which it seems we are expected to just accept as part of modern life. But should we just accept? Falsification, covering up, faking, masking, making it up are, for example, everyday features of internet activity. These are all examples of corruption eating away at moral principles for living, the most destructive disease of our age, from governments down to children at a desk in front of a screen. Today “the camera doesn’t lie” has no meaning. Although CCTV is used as evidence to convict criminals, CCTV footage can be doctored and falsified easily, as can photos and anything digital. Emails can be faked, and voices can be accurately imitated. Misinformation, deliberately promulgated, which is corruption, is like a parasitic worm consuming media.
If institutions become infected with the contagion of producing fake material or a culture of concealment or covering up, trust in them is eroded. But that is what is happening as illustrated by a few recent cases or reports. What will be worse is if a willingness to accept such behaviour as normal takes hold.
NHS
England’s Health Ombudsman, Rob Behrens, in a report of June 2023, described “a culture of cover-up” in the NHS, and “organised defensiveness” when it came to patients being harmed or suffering avoidable death. He found an NHS unable to learn from its mistakes, with the same repetitive failings time and time again. The recent report by The Times Health Commission reported similar findings. Is there perhaps some fundamental flaw in the NHS leadership that fosters this culture? But nobody seems accountable for this corruption, despite scandal after scandal.
OFSTED
“Ofsted inspectors make up evidence after IT system crashes”. This was an Observer headline to a report in the 4 February edition. Apparently since 2018 inspectors have been required to record data from inspections on an electronic evidence gathering platform. However, this report recounts inspectors who describe the regular crashing of the system. As a result, data and evidence which form the basis of inspection reports on schools are lost totally and irrevocably. It further states that this leads inspectors then to “make up” the data and evidence from memory without informing affected schools; and that there has been a lot of covering up and it alleges that senior leaders in Ofsted know about this practice.
If true and improvement only occurs due to outside pressure, the leadership of Ofsted may have succumbed to the cover-up virus. Unfortunately, once such corruption becomes accepted, it is hard to know where it will stop.
SCIENCE AND MEDICINE AT RISK
That same Observer carried a report about “the tidal wave of fake research papers”. Academic and research papers form the basis of scientists’ reputations and, for example, of the effectiveness and authenticity of new drugs. But last year it is reported that over 10,000 research papers had to be withdrawn from publication due to their falsification, and it is suspected that a great many more have simply not been found out. Science requires trustworthy foundations, and these are being seriously damaged by an increasing publication of fraudulent material.
Apparently, according to the report, this increase has its origins in China. There, young doctors and scientists are required to publish papers if they want promotion. And “paper mills” have grown up which are organisations in the shadows which provide, presumably for a price, ready-made but fabricated papers for publication. Also, in many countries it seems that academics are paid to publish papers. Discerning the true from the fake is becoming a massive burden for journals and editors.
A highly worrying warning bell is being sounded. For example, a drug, Ivermectin, was hailed as a wonder drug, even to treat Covid. However, it was discovered that the trials reported to have taken place to underpin research were falsified. The research process and so the drug itself could no longer be trusted. A chilling concern was aired by Professor Dorothy Bishop of Oxford University “People are building careers on the back of this tidal wave of fraudulent science and could end up running scientific institutions…. Corruption is creeping into the system.”
SUB-POSTMASTERS SCANDAL
The UK scandal of the Horizon cover-up which led to the lives of some 2,400 sub postmasters being destroyed, bankruptcies and even suicides is now being well publicised. But its foundation is in a virus of falsification, deception and cover up, at the Post Office and Fujitsu. The defects of the computer system which formed the evidence which led to serious allegations against, and conviction of innocent people were concealed. Senior people it seems are likely to have allowed at least, or even perhaps encouraged, this corruption.
TIP OF THE ICEBERG?
Institutions such as the police, and even the BBC in cases such as Martin Basheer relating to Princess Diana, are often the subject of allegations of cover up when facts emerge slowly, often only after investigative journalism or victims coming forward. Perhaps also only after public pressure so that non-disclosure by the relevant institution becomes impossible.
It is of course essential to be wary of allegations of serious corrupt behaviour when there is no substantial evidence, and to be wary of credence being given to mere assertions which are repeated over and over as if they are true. However, when public institutions or major corporations are concerned with falsifications or cover ups which are real, the reaction and penalties must be stringent and clear. Yet so often it seems that senior people can distance themselves from the corruption or are shielded from any consequence. This needs to change as otherwise the contagion can spread easily. People in authority need to be seriously disincentivised to turn a blind eye or stifle transparency. For example, is it not truly shocking that people say they never trust a politician or that politicians are expected to lie? It is the more shocking that this seems to be an accepted and unchallenged norm as if this cannot be changed. Yet not only the perception but the reality of politicians’ trustworthiness must change, or democracy is doomed.
Institutional corruption can only be lanced and surgically removed when those in charge are seen to be held to account. The providers of public services and those exercising authority or in charge of regulation have a special obligation to be seen to observe high standards. But it seems that among that group, in particular, lack of accountability is common. One suspects that the cover ups or fakes that are discovered may be the tip of an iceberg. After all, it is of the very nature and objective of fakes and cover ups that they remain undiscovered. How often is the concept that “everyone does it” invoked to justify plainly wrong behaviour? In an age when malevolent states such as Russia and China seek to disrupt and cause chaos through falsification, institutional trust in countries such as the UK is a vital and premium commodity.
If institutions which need to attract respect succumb to falsehood and concealment, then will not at least some individuals feel more inclined to falsify and deceive, for example perhaps in work absenteeism, covering up rather than admitting mistakes or in the eligibility for monetary state benefits?
Zero tolerance of corruption is a principle which is vital to the preservation of values such as integrity, honesty, impartiality and objectivity – these being the values of the Civil Service. Such values need to be vigorously enforced.
See also Sherbhert articles – Search for Truth and Information Overload
