Rule of law to give way to mob rule

The Telegraph reports that “Harriet Harman, the deputy Labour leader, indicated that the Government would intervene to reclaim the money by introducing new laws. She said that although his pension might be acceptable in a "court of law", it was not acceptable "in the court of public opinion".”

It sounds to me like this translates as “Existing laws mean that the government is obliged to honour contracts. A lot of people are angry at Sir Fred and think that we should not honour our contractual obligations to him. Fine. If enough people are baying for his blood, we’ll make new laws which will enable us to go back on our word. Retrospective legislation is something we are completely happy about.”

As Jeff Randall has gently pointed out, politicians should be cautious about going down this route. Perhaps the mob will be baying for their blood next.

Edit: I wrote this before reading posts at the LPUK blog, PJC Journal, Una(musings) and underdogs bite upward. I guess that I'll find that everyone else has said it too. Perhaps I didn't need to.

Or then again, perhaps we all need to. This a disgrace and a scandal.