Recover sense of public duty

Sir, - One of the most interesting Boomer intellectuals is Lyndon Johnson’s Oxfordeducated nephew Philip Bobbitt, author of the rightly-acclaimed Shield of Achilles.

In this he argues the nation state is giving way to the market state where loyalty and social responsibility are supplanted by a selfishness driven by profit and personal advantage.

The churches cry out for social justice and fairness but we shall have neither in our society until those who work in our public services recover their old sense of public duty.

For example, our strike-prone junior doctors have a sinister and politicised central committee that is losing the profession the respect in which it was held by ordinary people. Rev Dr John Cameron. 10 Howard Place, St Andrews.