Don’t treat us like idiots, give us the transparency we are paying for

I CAN remember when transparency was a political cliché.

Politicians and commentators alike used to sneer at it. OTA it was called – openness, transparency and accountability.

Those who argued and campaigned for it were all described as being on the high moral ground – a dangerous place to be for a politician because, it was argued, there was nowhere to go but down. For a while in the late 1980s, and definitely in the early 90s, it was fashionable to be concerned about transparency.