OPINION: Reward for an honourable profession

They have received this recognition at a time when the honours system has been under more public scrutiny than ever. This has been triggered by poet Benjamin Zephaniah's highly publicised refusal of an OBE and the disclosure of the large numbers of the great and the good who had turned down honours.

Now it is quite legitimate for people to take issue with awards that refer to some outdated notion of "empire". It is equally legitimate to raise questions about the methods by which people are selected for consideration. However, as far as youth work is concerned, its presence in the honours lists has been conspicuous by its absence. We have constantly bemoaned the fact that our work is unrecognised and undervalued. Yet when it is recognised in this way, through the only system available, recipients are immediately the butt of criticism among many of our colleagues.