Justice for Boris, ancient-style

Did Boris Johnson lie to the House about partygate? The Privileges Committee decided to investigate, but refused to take Mr Johnson’s ‘intention’ into account. However, Lord Pannick QC (now KC) has since claimed that ignoring ‘intention’ would be ‘unlawful’ in determining whether there had been a violation. The Committee disagrees. Could the ancients help?

Argument about the nature of law and justice has ever been at the heart of western thinking. Some early Greek philosophers maintained that only a form of metaphysical ‘justice’ kept a chaotic universe, riven with competing forces, stable. When Socrates (c. 470-399 bc) shifted the emphasis towards the purpose of existence, debates about the meaning of human justice intensified. Some believed that it consisted of ‘giving every man his due’, the principle of quid pro quo behind much ancient thinking; some that it was nothing but the interest of the stronger; some that it was the good life of the individual; some that it was an aspiration towards the common good.

But justice is realised in the law, a rich field for debate, then as now, and Aristotle saw that, however desirable it might be to produce rational, universally applicable laws, no legislator could possibly anticipate every human situation to which the laws might apply.

He therefore argued that there was scope for the correction of a law ‘where it was defective because of its universality’, i.e. the law remained correct as a general rule but unexpected circumstances called for tweaking. So Aristotle pointed out that it would be right to do wrong if it could be justified, e.g. lying to save someone’s life.

Back to Mr Johnson. Whether or not one can lie unintentionally, the Privileges Committee contends that ‘intention’ is irrelevant because lying to parliament is a fixed matter, rather like the laws of a game. But might there be a defence of justification (e.g. a beer after work was not a party but justice – a quid pro quo – for hard-working colleagues)? After all, that is what lawyers are for.