In Praise of Corruption

Tony Blair offered this explanation for the cash for honours crisis in the academies system yesterday: "I think if someone gives £2m of their own money, time, effort, energy, years of hard work - isn't that something we should be saying 'that's a great thing that they have done'?"

Let us note that he does not specify what they should be doing in order for them to gain our praise. Drug dealers pulling off a major deal, celebrities having their own houses built, Roman Abramovich - all of these fulfil the criteria he sets out. How you give £2 million of your own time I do not know. Or £2 million of your energy - presumably you'd get a special tarriff from your electicity provider if you were spending that much...

Wonderfully, Tony has given us the perfect rationale for bribing the government: "Look, if someone goes to the effort of buying a minister a house, thereby saving the public purse that cost, takes them on holiday, maybe pays their kids' school fees - shouldn't we be celebrating that, not condemning it? The problem with Britain is that we are so hidebound by our disinclination for 'corruption'. My new, reformed 'morality..."