Highlighting the needy with Anthony Bernard.

The Post Office scandal confronts us with society at its worst, with the failure of the police and social services in Rochdale to look after young women also concerning.

Large organisations bully staff into conformity, complex technology is believed to be perfect, top managers maintain an image hoping for further advancement, lesser managers lie their way out of corners and ordinary staff are swept along rather than stand out against obvious wrong.

Bullying is at the forefront of our world, the strong trying to control the weak. The Post Office scandal shows the terrible problems of people wrongly accused with an inquiry as to how a large and apparently responsible company started lying, cheating and bullying. The challenge now is to identify and bring to account the criminal behaviour of individuals who were the prime movers as well as others merely complicit.

Russia is bullying the Ukraine, Hamas tried to bully Israel, now Israel is bullying Palestine. "All power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely" to quote a famous statement. China is trying to bully Taiwan, America wants its own way in world politics, but most people worldwide want to live ordinary lives and go along with whatever seems best for them!

Closer to home, the cost of living is worsened by prices being increased faster than costs and millions of pounds being stolen by scams preying on people looking for extra bargains. Market forces will straighten this out eventually as people start checking prices. This is not new, in my Food Bank days I remember crawling on all fours in a supermarket to find and reach the small quantities of least cost products consigned to bottom shelves with just a few tins stuck at the back! Wealthy people could shop standing tall; poor people had to crawl around to find the highly promoted bargains, as the Food Bank did to maximise the benefit of cash donations!

Landlords are raising rents because the market says they can, displacing otherwise settled tenants into a choice between eviction and financial catastrophe. The housing problem is exacerbated by permanent rented homes becoming holiday lets, because it is more profitable. Estate Agents enjoy the extra cash and represent landlords over tenants.

Like Fujitsu and the Post Office, lobbies promote advantages to business because local councils like a thriving business sector and motorists don't like potholes. Devon County Council needs financial support for our most vulnerable children, those with special needs and disabilities. They must balance the needs of vulnerable children with the occasional damaged front suspension from speeding down a poorly maintained back road. Is that a difficult choice?

Large organisations seek loyalty. Individuals are nudged into conformity by peer pressure or social media. Turning a "blind eye" can seem a small step when someone else is responsible. But honesty and integrity are not flexible, even if decisions are open for debate. When complaints are passed up the chain of command and the wrong answer proves acceptable, then the whole is surely corrupt. If people at the top can't see what is going wrong they are either incompetent or complicit.

Each of us has a whistle, we all have the chance to be a whistleblower against bullies. Bad decisions, whether criminal or just selfish, should be tested against what is best for the whole of society, including the homeless, the disabled, the vulnerable, the needy and us ordinary folk.