Badly misjudged

David Blunkett recently described himself as an honest man but not a saint and yesterday, in a statement setting out his involvement with DNA Bioscience, a paternity testing company, he certainly justified the second part of that claim. From start to finish, his dealings with the business have been ill-judged and his handling of it inept. By asking his sons to sell the shares they hold in the company on his behalf, he has done only the minimum needed to extract himself from the episode.

On April 21, while the government was campaigning for re-election and Mr Blunkett was on the brink of a return to the cabinet that was widely-predicted, not least by himself, he made the extraordinary decision to join DNA Bioscience's board as a director. This allowed him to buy £15,000 worth of shares on his first day, shares that would have greatly increased in value had the company floated, as it aimed to, next year. Allies of Mr Blunkett say that he faces "mega-money legal bills" after last year's legal battle over the paternity of William Quinn, the baby son of his former lover. But necessity is no excuse to take shortcuts to raise cash. The question is not whether Mr Blunkett needed the money, but whether he went about raising it in an appropriate way.

Former ministers are free to work with businesses and serving ministers are free to own shares in trust, but both must abide by the rules. At the very least Mr Blunkett broke the spirit of the code governing ministerial behaviour by failing to seek permission before accepting the directorship. He pointed out yesterday that he registered the shareholding as an MP, informed his permanent secretary as a minister and transferred the shares to his sons when he took office. But the code is clear: "On leaving office ministers should seek advice from the independent Advisory Committee on Business Appointments". Mr Blunkett accepts that he failed to do this. He points out that the committee's chair, Lord Mayhew, told him last year that the system is only "a voluntary and advisory one" and he is right that there is confusion. He may well have persuaded himself that he was acting within the rules. But in one sense the detail does not matter. Anyone with an ounce of commonsense should have paused to consider whether joining the board of such a company so close to his likely return to government was an appropriate thing to do. By selling the shares, as he had to, Mr Blunkett has removed the potential for a future conflict of interest and his family will not profit from any flotation. But he does not come out of it well.