In years to come, psychologists will be writing doctoral theses on the responses by British MPs to the charges of dishonesty in the great allowances scandal of 2009. In the meantime it has been fascinating to apply that profession’s existing state of knowledge to the events of the past week; Ethics in Psychotherapy and Counselling: A Practical Guide (2007), by Kenneth Pope and Melba Vasquez, has been most helpful.

In a section entitled Using Words to Deceive, Pope and Vasquez identify what they call “eight bogus apologies”. These include: “substitute the general for the specific”, “use the passive voice”, “use the abstract language of technicalities”, “make unimportant by contrasting with what did not occur”, “smother the events in the language of attack” and “replace intentional unethical behaviour with the language of accidents, misfortune and mistakes”.

This last is perhaps the one most favoured by those caught out in false claims under the much abused “additional costs allowance”. For example, Jack Straw, the Blackburn MP and justice secretary, shown to have successfully claimed reimbursement for the full council tax on a home for which he had in fact received a 50% council tax discount, said: “I will not be the only person in Blackburn who’s made an error in good faith . . . the system needs reform.” As a matter of fact, I do believe Straw was guilty of incompetence rather than theft, but the “error in good faith” rubric, combined with blaming “the system”, has become the stock response with which we have become wearily familiar.

The locus classicus of the “good faith” get-out was provided by Tony Blair, after it became clear beyond dispute that the Iraq war had been based on false claims. He declared, inimitably: “I have searched my conscience, not in the spirit of obstinacy, but in genuine reconsideration . . . For any mistakes made in good faith I of course take full responsibility.”

It’s true the phrase “good faith” is widely used in legal argument, but in a politician’s hands it is also cunningly designed to create the impression that the person concerned is actually “good” as well as, in Blair’s case, motivated by some higher moral authority.

Similarly, that other maddening phrase so favoured by the allowance abusers – “it was a genuine mistake” – has an intended meaning beyond merely the avoidance of a straightforward apology. So when Andy Burnham, the culture secretary, describes as “a genuine mistake” his claiming for a towelling robe as “wholly necessary” for the performance of his parliamentary duties, we are meant to think not just that this was better than an ordinary unadorned mistake, but that this is the sort of error made by a “genuine” person.

The use of the “passive voice” was the choice of Margaret Beckett when David Dimbleby asked her on BBC1’s Question Time about her claiming for hanging baskets and pot plants. The feisty housing minister responded: “That was a mistake. It should not have been made.” The first person singular is notable by its absence.

Although the subsequent heckling of Mrs Beckett was judged to be a news story, this was much less interesting than Sir Menzies Campbell’s defence of his own behaviour in charging his interior decorator’s bill to the taxpayer. He told the studio audience he had now decided that it was wrong to have done this and he would repay the money; but when Dimbleby asked the former leader of the Liberal Democrats why this thought had not occurred to him when he made the claim, Campbell blurted: “The public perceptions at the time were quite different.”

Here, under pressure from an expert inquisitor, was something much closer to the truth than all these carefully contrived official statements of regret. Campbell – a man whose moral tone has always managed to be simultaneously grandiloquent and prim – was saying nothing more than: “Back then we thought we could get away with it.” Moral Ming, let’s not forget, had “decided” to repay the money only after his dealings had been made public.

Perhaps the most convoluted of all the bogus apologies came from the husband-and-wife team of Tory MPs Andrew MacKay and Julie Kirkbride; they nominated two different properties as their singular designated “second home”, thus getting the public to finance both their houses. While Kirkbride said, “I bitterly regret the system” (substituting the general for the specific), her husband told his constituency association: “I am sorry we have all become embroiled in this expenses row, particularly as I was following advice.” Yes, it was the junior clerks of the parliamentary fees office who should apologise for allowing MPs to make claims that have not survived a day of public scrutiny. Of course, it would be too much to expect such honourable members to have made their own independent judgment of what was right and proper.

Have any MPs taken the route of “smothering the apology in the language of attack”? You bet. The long-serving Labour MP Harry Cohen, who had claimed hundreds of thousands for a second-home allowance while designating as a “main home” a single-bedroom schoolhouse 70 miles from his constituency, explained on his website: “In the mid-1980s Conservative backbenchers pressurised Margaret Thatcher to increase their salaries. She instructed the Treasury minister John Moore to meet their demands without an outright salary increase. He did this via allowances, particularly the additional cost allowance, which he confirmed would be a light system as far as receipts were concerned. As such, the allowance was meant to be a salary addendum.” So, you see, it was all Thatcher’s fault and nothing whatever to do with any decisions taken by Cohen as a free moral agent in the intervening 25 years.

The same trick was attempted by the Corby and East Northamptonshire constituency Labour party: Phil Hope, its MP, is to repay the £41,700 he charged the taxpayer for refurbishing his London home – he obviously has good taste in furniture. It issued a statement declaring: “It is regrettable that a decent MP like ours has had his integrity undermined. It is perfectly obvious that the present system of remuneration and expenses, inherited from the Thatcher era, is open to misinterpretation and misunderstanding.”

This attempt by the local Labour party to blame it all on Thatcher and the Tories would have been slightly less comic, were it not that Philip Hollobone, the Conservative representing the neighbouring constituency of Kettering, regularly submits the lowest expenses claim of any MP. Mr Hollobone is one of a substantial number of MPs who merit their automatic title of “honourable”. It is a torment to them that their reputations, too, have been dragged into the mire, as the mass of the general public seem to assume that all MPs are on the take.

Perhaps they should recall the words of Francis Bacon in his essay Of Great Place: “Men in great place are thrice servants: servants of the sovereign or state; servants of fame; and servants of business. So as they have no freedom; neither in their persons, nor in their actions, nor in their times. It is a strange desire, to seek power and lose liberty: or to seek power over others, and to lose power over a man’s self.” In other words, politicians had to endure the same peculiar form of misery four centuries ago.

Bacon’s own glittering parliamentary career ended in disgrace in 1621 when he was charged with corruption. His response to the charges was a confession, which he did not seek to mitigate, excuse or blame on “the system”: “My Lords, it is my act, my hand and my heart.” Now that’s the way to do it.

dominic.lawson@sunday-times.co.uk

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