'Unlinking' a link for users without permission
Here's what I've come up with myself. It works fine:

if(user_access('edit record')) {
    $link = l(t('Edit this record'), 'edit-record/' . $nid);
} else {
    $link = t('Edit this record');
}


If you know of a 'cleaner' more 'correct' way. Please let me know. Thanks