Sigh of relief

Teachers who organise school trips are getting more and more nervous that they'll be held responsible for every little cock-up that takes place, however innocent or unpredictable. So much so that some teachers are refusing to organise such trips altogether - to the great disappointment of the kids who lose out.

But teachers who went on a school trip to Belize where two pupils were raped have been held not responsible, and the pupils themselves have been told their behaviour was partly to blame.

That doesn't excuse the rapes of course, but it does help teachers who're stressed out with anticipating every possible accident and mishap and waiting for an accusing finger to be pointed at them.

The High Court found that the pupils had broken two basic rules of the trip by letting a man into their cabin and drinking alcohol. And they had not asked him to leave.

The court also found that the teachers had no reason to suspect the rapist, the resort owner's son, who had no criminal record and as far as they knew had not behaved improperly to anyone.

The teachers must have been greatly relieved, especially as the case has taken seven years to reach court - presumably seven years of nailbiting anxiety and self-accusation. Perhaps the teachers deserve to get damages for all the anguish they've been through.

The fact is that with the best will in the world, and with all possible precautions being taken, disasters can still occur. You just have to accept that they couldn't be prevented and deal with them as best you can. Dragging people through the courts seldom helps.

Little monsters

It's a common belief that some children are born nasty and vicious and they'll never change. I don't accept that, I'm convinced any child will be just great as long as they're brought up properly.

What produces monsters is parents who don't love their children and don't know how to bring out their innate goodness and sensitivity. If they're aided and abetted by teachers who write off children's potential and assume they'll never achieve much, then naturally those children will be messed up.

Look at any child who's developed a mean streak and become "impossible" and I'm sure you'll find these negative factors at the root of it. There are many many parents out there who really have little idea of the right way to bring up a child.

Of course parents will say "Ah, but you don't have children. You don't know what they can be like. Some children are trouble from the word go and there's nothing you can do about it. You can bust a gut trying to sort them out and you'll get nowhere. Some kids are simply beyond the pale."

But there are plenty of people working with children who say that's not the case. They maintain adamantly that difficult children can be turned around if you just treat them the right way, if you understand why they've become so wayward.

I'm sure we can all think of mature, responsible adults who at one time were complete tearaways. It's not a predestined path, young hoodlums don't have to be hoodlums for the rest of their life.

Camila Batmanghelidjh of Kids' Company for one has helped hundreds of children to shake off their dysfunctional past and become the positive individuals they were meant to be. People used to call her a crazy idealist but not any longer. They've seen the practical results of her work and they know she's wiser than all the defeatists and cynics. For her, writing people off is just not an option.

Nosy bosses

How much prying into your private life is an employer entitled to do in the name of protecting their reputation? How far can they go before you tell them to mind their own business?

Some employers routinely monitor their workers' drinking, smoking and drug use, check their criminal records, vet their emails and favoured websites, or ban controversial activities like political protests. Is all this personal surveillance really justified?

I suspect a lot of this nosiness is just a way of showing who's boss and has little to with the firm's reputation.

I shouldn't think their customers care a jot who has a cocaine habit or who wants to smash capitalism as long as they do their job properly.

But this very week a teacher in Cambridge was reprimanded by her Principal for posing in her underwear on a website. She had jeopardised the school's reputation, he said, and acted inappropriately. He ordered the immediate removal of the photos from the website and was consulting his superiors about further action.

Do the pupils or parents really think these risqué photos have affected her teaching? I doubt it. More likely, they were just intrigued and amused.

Of course some personal monitoring is necessary. Making sure that anyone working with children has no history of child abuse is important. Likewise ensuring that pilots aren't drunk in the cockpit. But beyond these basic safeguards, your private life should be your concern and nobody else's.

Objecting to employees who wear crosses, wear earrings, sport tattoos, or dye their hair a strange colour, is ridiculous. All those sartorially-correct bankers still managed to screw up the economy big-time. Maybe a few purple-haired, multi-pierced ones would have done a better job?

If you ask me, the people who really deserve close scrutiny are not ordinary employees but all those sneaky politicians busy lining their pockets at our expense. As far as they're concerned, the more prying the better.

Question: Would it be equally "inappropriate" if the teacher had posted her holiday snaps, lying on the beach in her bikini? Would it be inappropriate that a pupil might have seen her semi-naked on the sand? Someone's seriously over-reacting here.

The child within

The older I get, the more I realise just how much of my character is directly linked to the way I was treated as a child. And I'm sure that's the same for most people.

I can see more and more clearly that both my weaknesses and my strengths reflect how my parents and teachers behaved towards me.

My nervousness about socialising goes right back to my diffident father, who seldom had visitors or visited other people. My lack of self-confidence stems from his regular disapproval of what I did and thought.

On the other hand, my wild sense of humour also comes from my father, who adored crazy comedy programmes like The Goon Show and Hancock's Half Hour. And my verbal skills owe much to my father's adeptness with words.

School bullying and a brilliant English teacher also contributed to the strange mix of self-doubt and articulacy.

However much I've tried in later life to correct the weaknesses and become more capable, I haven't got very far. Patterns laid down in childhood are remarkably durable and aren't easily changed once they've taken root.

All I can do is allow for my failings and try to ensure other people aren't upset or frustrated by them. And at the same time enjoy my strengths to the full, savouring the talents I do have and making the most of them.

I don't blame my parents or teachers for my faults. They were probably doing the best they could, limited by their own deficiencies and their own upbringings.

If I didn't have these particular faults, I would no doubt have other ones. None of us is perfect, and in any case so-called faults can sometimes be as interesting and endearing as the effortless virtues.

But that chain of cause and effect, of the early years determining the later years, seems more and more visible and far-reaching.

"Give me a child until he is seven, and I will give you the man" said the Jesuit, Francis Xavier.