The BBC reports that Jack Straw, the UK’s Foreign Secretary, has repaid £1500 he claimed in ‘error’.

“Claim: The justice secretary over-claimed £1,500 on council tax on his second home. He made a claim for the full bill despite getting a 50% discount from the local authority for the property.

Response: A spokesman for Mr Straw said he acted within the rules. He spotted the mistaken council tax claim himself and repaid the money himself. Mr Straw later told the BBC: “I have acted in complete good faith and within the rules. It is an error, which obviously I wish hadn’t happened, but in circumstances in which I was incredibly busy during that period – that is not an excuse, it is just an explanation.”

Is Jack’s error a genuine mistake, or something more unsavoury? I have no idea, though I would have thought that when Straw filled in his claim he would have had the council tax bill in front of him, and the bill would have clearly shown the discount and the net amount payable. However, mistakes do happen and, no doubt, Straw is a very busy fellow.

The incident caused me to consider what I would have done if an employee of mine, let’s call him Jack, had come to me and said he had discovered he had over claimed £1500 in expenses and now wanted to repay the money.

If the incident had occurred at a time when Jack had no particular reason to fear exposure I would probably just accepted the cheque and thought that he had made a genuine mistake.

If it had occurred whilst we were carrying out a special audit and Jack had real reason to fear that his ‘error’ would be discovered by others, then the response might be a little different. I would still have accept the cheque, but I would have set someone to check all of Jack’s past claims. I would also have looked very carefully at anything Jack did in the future. There would be a cloud over him.

Probably I would be doing Jack an injustice, but checking would be a reasonable and responsible course of action on my part.

So it is with Jack Straw. We cannot have a cloud hanging over a Cabinet Minister, especially one who is Secretary of State for Justice.  The responsible thing to do would be to have the affair examined by an independent body, such as the Police or the National Audit Office.