Private lives in public view

Written by Vincent Cable MP and published in Informer on Tue 31st Jan 2006

The private lives of public figures are again in the news. This week it has involved several of my party's leading lights. Attention will soon shift to the other two major parties, the Royal family, bishops, or stars of screen, pop music and the football pitch. Celebrities and scandal make a good story, be it over drink, drugs, sexual orientation, prostitution or dodgy financial dealings.

Those of us who chose a career in the public eye cannot expect to avoid public scrutiny. Nor should we complain too much if the coverage is unflattering. But there are ways of dealing with it.

The first, obviously, is to be blameless. But few achieve perfection.

The second is to be totally honest since the truth emerges eventually. Chris Smith, the Labour minister who announced that he was gay and also carried HIV, earned great respect as a result.

The third is to refuse to discuss one's past private life. David Cameron has dealt with drug accusations in this way and has succeeded so far. But privacy is a stronger defence for personal relationships than illegal activity.

There are two things to avoid. The first is to deny the truth and then be caught out, as my colleagues were. The original weakness is then compounded by apparent dishonesty. The second is hypocrisy: preaching one thing and practising another, as with Conservative ministers who preached 'family values' and were caught having affairs or Socialists who denounce greed while making a pile on the side.

I hope and expect that my own party will make a swift recovery, probably under Sir Menzies Campbell. But it has been a painful lesson.