Hysteria in High Places

Yesterday I heard Harriet Harmen say, of Sir F. Goodwin's pension:

"It may be enforceable in a court of law, but it is not enforceable in the court of public opinion and that is where the government steps in"

There is no court of public opinion, so that part of her pronouncement is nonsense, but what she seems to propose is that laws need not be enforced if the consequences are unpopular.

 The Labour Party has been in office for nearly twelve years. The much deplored excesses of company directors have been perpetrated under a regulatory system which the government could have revised at any time in that period. Even under the present system, the government could have reduced the Goodwin pension; it didn't because it did not understand what was going on.

It is outrageous to react to this mess by proposing an end to the rule of law.

I don't know whether Harmen was being consciously irresponsible, or is just too stupid to realise the import of what she said. In either case she is unfit for public office.