As we enter the new year, I fear for the future of my four-year-old, growing up in a world where if you are a teacher, a nurse or a fireman you are always going to struggle in life.

Whereas, if you are a footballer, a singer, a model or an actor, you can sometimes expect to earn more than a country's economy.

What is this world where the entertainers can be so rewarded and the people who provide valuable services are fighting poverty?

This civilisation is based on fakeness and insincerity. How can someone earn millions a year knowing more than half the world's population is poor?

I fear that a few greed-stained people make this world worse for the vast majority of honest and decent human beings. I fear that, one day, we shall wake up to find no teachers, no nurses and no firemen.

Everyone will have become a footballer, an actor or a model. Imagine that. We will then value our teachers, nurses and firemen. Reality check are the keywords for 2003.

-Munir Syed, Sherbourne Close, Hove