About 30 years ago when Britain was in the early stages of MPs and peers being hauled up for financial irregularities, I recall the colleague of a disgraced MP being interviewed on television.
He told a reporter, quite brazenly, that in his colleague’s case ‘his only crime was being caught’.
Similar sentiments have been voiced about Marine Le Pen, who along with some Rassemblement National associates has been given a suspended prison sentence, a heavy fine and a four-year ban from public office.
There is no doubt that Ms Le Pen got what was coming to her: but those expressing concerns at the sentence are not just her own supporters.
The most prominent to express doubts at the wisdom of the ruling has been François Bayrou, prime minister of the centrist coalition that for the moment runs France.
He and Ms Le Pen are not best friends, and he appears to have little sympathy for her politics.
Given those things, his long experience of politics and his current eminence, one is forced to conclude that if he feels all this is a bad idea, then it probably is.
I am with Mr Bayrou on this.
My own problem with Ms Le Pen is that many of her policies appear to come from the hard left, not the hard right; and if she became president of France the ensuing turbulence would be considerable.
But I am in no doubt that it is France’s best interests to have her in the field for the 2027 presidential election; because what happened in court smells much like an establishment effort to close her down.
She is appealing, and neither the fine nor the suspended sentence (for part of which she must wear an electronic tag) will be enforced until an appeal is heard, but the ban on seeking public office is in force now.
It is reported that the appeal will be heard by June 2026.
This would allow her plenty of time, if the ban were lifted, to campaign for the presidential elections scheduled to be held in April and May of the following year.
Also, the very fact of this ruling against her is guaranteed to keep her profile high among French electors, so she will not suffer in that respect.
But if the appeal does not allow her to run, the consequences for France and for Europe could be considerable.
So far, we have little idea who might be able to run against her for the presidency; Mr Macron cannot run again, the Parti socialiste is in ruins, the Républicains are squabbling among themselves and La France Insoumise continues to attract a far-left rump of the disaffected.
Le Pen's presidential chances
However, that is not to say that Ms Le Pen would be a shoo-in if she were allowed to stand: it is quite possible that voters will gang up against her (as they did in 2022, as well as in the imaginary contest in Michel Houellebecq’s magnificent novel Soumission, published in 2015) and put in a candidate on the grounds that he or she is not Ms Le Pen.
However, a semi-martyrdom, or a complete martyrdom, at the hands of the French justice system could alter such suppositions drastically.
If the court drops the ban on her seeking office, then she can run on the basis that she was the candidate the system could not destroy.
She could present herself as having fought injustice, and defeated it.
She would doubtless attract sympathy from many French who detest the system as much as she does, and who feel it has been utterly ineffectual in improving their lives, their living standards and (to quote General de Gaulle) their idea of France.
The old ploy of voting for anyone-but-Le Pen might not work in such circumstances.
Electorates even in advanced and civilised countries can reach the point where they are fed up with an established governing class telling them what to think and how to vote, and as a consequence do precisely the opposite: think of Brexit.
But what if the court does not overturn its decision?
Then the RN has to find another candidate, and that seems likely to be Jordan Bardella, the party’s president, even though he will be just 31 when the election occurs.
Mr Bardella is charismatic, smart and effective, and he is unburdened by the name of Le Pen and the echoes that brings of the overt racism of the old Front national.
I am not a betting man but if I were I would put money on him to win, if he ends up standing.
Ironically, he probably has a better chance than Ms Le Pen, not least because he could portray the decision to bar her from standing as being the most monstrous violation not just of her rights, but of the rights of millions of French citizens who wanted to vote for her.
It is all very predictable.
Are bans from politics a political tool?
The level of malpractice among both local and national politicians in France appears to have reached epidemic levels.
In 2019, 1,518 ineligibility sentences were delivered by French courts.
In 2023 the number had ballooned to 16,364.
However, of the vast number from 2023, only 3.9% were enforced immediately, as Ms Le Pen’s was.
This would appear to give her serious cause to complain, and to justify Mr Bayrou’s concern at the ruling.
Given how experienced he is, I suspect he has some idea of the chaos that would ensue from the order remaining in force.
A Bardella presidency would put France on a collision course with Brussels, to start with, not least because many RN militants associated pressure from Brussels with the original sentence.
It would also bring the judiciary under fire and would undermine the rule of law in France, which is no small matter.
In the country’s interests, someone needs to think again.
