Should David Laws be jailed?

[chuckskull]

...or should Shirley Frost be set free?

Both have used the government's incompetence to steal over £40k from the taxpayer.

One gets 18months in jail. One has been pretty much told publicly 'once this has blown over you can come back'.

To my mind they both committed the same crime, to a similar extent. One or the other, they both go free or the both go to jail, which should it be?

[cptwhite_uk]

They're completely different circumstances, whether you agree with it or not. So your question is irrelevant, however I will not argue this with you as I've already wasted enough time on the subject of Laws in the main thread in GD.

[chuckskull]

Yes they are different circumstances, done by different means, exploiting different systems, but they both defrauded the taxpayer for £40,000 and got wildly different punishments. Either that is a serious criminal offence which justifies jail time or it isn't. Regardless of whether you work in TKmaxx or the House of Commons.

Claiming the circumstances are completely incomparable and any comparison irrelevant is a bit ridiculous, but if you don't want to 'waste your time', don't.

[SeriousSam]

It may be the same crime to your mind but I can assure you they are not.

She claimed money she was NOT entitled to, whereas as he claimed money he WAS entitled to. The issue in his case was who the money was going to, as if there was no "relationship" then there would not have been a problem.

[Terbinator]

Lulz, at first I thought the title was eluding to his sexuality for reasons to lock him up - glad that I was wrong.

Him being put on trial wouldn't be too far out of the question though I would imagine, a precedent has already been set with Elliot Morley and co.

[Saracen]

Yes they are different circumstances, done by different means, exploiting different systems, but they both defrauded the taxpayer for £40,000 and got wildly different punishments. Either that is a serious criminal offence which justifies jail time or it isn't. Regardless of whether you work in TKmaxx or the House of Commons.

Claiming the circumstances are completely incomparable and any comparison irrelevant is a bit ridiculous, but if you don't want to 'waste your time', don't.

Any criminal sentence takes a variety of factors into account, either to mitigate or to compound the offence. For example, if it is the last offence is a string of comparable offences, then the sentence is likely to be harsher, because part of the point of the sentence is to deter, and you obviously didn't get the message on previous occasions. That's not to say it always works, but it's part of the logic. This principle starts in the Magistrate's Court over things as relatively trivial as fines for speeding offences, and goes right the way up the tree.

Therefore, even assuming that they both "defrauded" the taxpayer, and I'll come back to that in a minute, their history is different. Would Shirley Frost have received that sentence for a first offence? Probably not. But, according to that article, she has a long record of dishonesty. Laws, as far as we know or as far as I have any grounds to suspect, doesn't.

On the other hand, those that seek and gain public office should be held to higher standards.

Next, was what Laws did "fraud"? Without seeking to anticipate the results of the Parliamentary enquiry, and based on reports I've seen and read not personal acquaintance with the facts, it certainly seems he broke Parliamentary rules, but as far as I can make out, did not claim money he could not have claimed in different ways. For instance, had he rented a flat and claimed for that, then lived part-time with his lover, the claim would have been legit. He could, apparently, have claimed more than he did.

Also, his claim was not for personal gain, whereas Shirley Frost's fraud clearly was. Arguably, it was not even for his lover's gain, since he could have rented the room out to someone else, at market rate. That's rather different to Frost's antics, and to her history.

I think it is indisputable that the two situations are very different.

However .... the 2006 Fraud Act has redrawn the definitions of and some of the nature of the offence of fraud, and what Laws (according to reports) did certainly seems to come pretty close to the definitions, though many of them rely crucially on acts being "dishonest" and it may be arguable as to whether what he did was dishonest.

Also, absolutely central to the definitions of fraud is "intent". If, as he maintains, the intent was to protect privacy, and if he actually claimed no more (or less) money than he was entitled to claim had he done it another way, but that other way would have "outed" him, then it may be hard to prove the intent was gain, whether personal or for another.

So, overall, my conclusions are :-

1) The two cases are not comparable, other than superficially.
2) If, repeat if what he did fits the definitions of fraud, then he ought to be tried accordingly.


I completely sympathise, and agree, that the notion of him coming back after the dust settles is an outrage, and if it happens, it will utterly destroy any hope I have that the attitude of politicians to expenses has, for all their protestations, changed an iota. At the moment, for me, the jury is out. I'm hopeful, but not wildly optimistic that they've wised up. If they do a Mandy on him and politically resurrect him after a period, then clearly they haven't been listening

As for jail .... if and only if they have a basis for a trial and can make it stick. Even then, circumstances will determine sentence, not mere monetary comparisons.

[chuckskull]

She claimed money she was NOT entitled to, whereas as he claimed money he WAS entitled to. The issue in his case was who the money was going to, as if there was no "relationship" then there would not have been a problem.

...but there was a relationship, so he was no longer entitled to the money.

Shirley Frost was entitled to the money, the issue in her case was, she started working, therefore she was no longer entitled to the money.

Both continued claiming money they were no longer entitled to, a fact, of which they were both well aware, for their own personal reasons and no matter how you cut it, for their own personal gain.

Nothing to do with Laws sexuality, I don't care who or what anyone does with their genitals, so long as everyone involved is a consenting adult.

EDIT for saracen: Thanks for the insight into the actual legal side of it. I used the term defraud in a in a more general manner(dishonestly acquiring money). I'm the first to admit IANAL.

We both cross posted and touched on a similar point about personal gain. I think he did gain from it. The 40 grand didn't go straight into his pocket, but he did gain from it. If he wasn't gaining from it, he would have done it differently. The obvious one being living with your partner and not claiming any money at all, because you live your partner and unless Mr Law's relationships differ massively from mine, share the same bed, so renting a room strikes me as deliberately dishonest, and not for the sake of privacy.

[Saracen]

On the "gain" point, I should make clear the gain doesn't have to be personal. The s2, s3 and s4 Fraud offences can all be "to make a gain for himself or another, ... ". The offence would be the same whether the gain was for laws, or for another. But it still needs to be dishonest, and "intent" still needs to be proven. Both can be tricky to establish, especially the latter.

Laws sexuality is relevant though, if only in that his avowed intent was to protect his privacy. I don't give a damn what his inclinations are, but I can sympathise with his wish to not upset loved ones (like parents) especially if they hold beliefs that, for instance, condemn homosexuality. Then, he has a decision .... does he come out openly and upset them, or does he try to keep it private and not upset them. Personally, I'm of the opinion that each of us should be able to keep our proclivities a private matter between ourselves and our partners, and it's nobody else's business. Were I gay, and were my parents vehemently against it, I would not wish to either provoke a argument or split, or to upset them, by telling them. That is between him and whomever he was trying to avoid telling.

The issue comes when he's claiming money he's not, according to the rules, allowed to claim.

But, if he is not claiming money he could not have claimed had he done it differently (which meant his secret coming out), then the intent was not gain, but protecting his privacy. He should not have decided that protecting his privacy justified breaking the rules. That much is clear. Either he should have claimed within the rules, or simply not claimed. But, if his account is genuine, I am inclined to think that his intent was protecting privacy, not gain. He is, after all (and according to reports) a multi-millionaire anyway. The sums involved were relatively trivial to him, which suggests gain is not a credible motive. However that too is a double-edged sword .... if the sums are trivial to him, why claim them? Why not just forego them, and protect his privacy that way? If he had done that, it still would not have all come out!

[chuckskull]

Apparently his millions are long gone. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/politics/10278151.stm Despite him playing the "I didn't need the money" card earlier.

On a related note http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/politics/10302927.stm MP's expenses watchdog chief quits for "the sake of his health and sanity". Can't blame him.

[Ktulu]

I wish more crooked American politicians got put away for stuff like this. If you are a public official in my country it seems like the money you get from fraud comes with the position and not even 1% get caught for being thieves.

[Saracen]

There's some truth in that, Ktulu. We Brit's beat ourselves up over our politicians, but in fact most of it is pretty small change, and we have a fairly well curtailed lobbying industry ... or at least, overtly, it's fairly well contained. We have had some recent scandals over peddling both "access", and the "cash for questions" allegations, and over course (and without seeking to prejudge the outcome) court cases with three MPs and one Peer facing criminal charges that might lead, on convicted, to jail time. And nor would it be the first time in recent years that Parliamentarians have ended up behind bars for some fairly serious offences, not least of which was perjury.

Perhaps as damaging as anything is the feeling that most of us seem to be getting that some politicians think they are above the law, and it wasn't helped by those MPs currently facing court claiming that their expenses abuses were protected by Parliamentary privilege. Cheeky gits.