I WAS brought-up to believe that lying was immoral and wrong.

It was widely expected by society that anyone exposed as a liar would be punished, shunned, even ridiculed. I am sure most people are familiar with the little playground ditty, “Liar, liar, pants on fire”.

St Thomas Aquinas believed that when one lies one undermines trust in society. The Bible teaches us that lying is a perversion of all that is good and noble. The Eighth Commandment states: “Thou shalt not bear false witness.”

When did this change? When did it become socially and morally acceptable to lie? Politicians lie to us all the time. Bankers do it too, so do gas and oil companies. In fact, it is now the accepted form of practice throughout the fossil fuel industry.

These companies appear to follow a different moral philosophy to the rest of society. Third Energy executives are sitting with flames licking around their leather-bound chairs, laughing at Ryedale people, safe in the knowledge that nothing is really being done to stop them fracking at Kirby Misperton.

Simon Wilkinson, Thornton-le-Dale