There is one annoying word that rears its head almost every time the debate about the sanctity of the private lives of politicians cranks up. Hypocrisy.

Like so many high-profile political leaders, Mike Rann has been perfectly happy to exploit his private life when it suited him.

Wedding pictures, family interviews, sporting scenes, intellectual pursuits, off to church, Womens Weekly covers: this is stuff of human interest that most politicians feed relentlessly and manipulatively to the media whenever it suits their political positioning requirements.

Yet the moment there is even a hint of that other private human pursuit — sex — politicians and their boosters instantly flip the propaganda switch and demand silence in the name of privacy.

Which is not to argue a case for unlimited or unregulated intrusion into the private lives of public figures, but to make the case for proportionality and public accountability.

Under the rules of engagement for responsible media coverage, public officials’ private lives should be off limits unless:

  • There is a clear or implied conflict between public and private actions or statements.
  • There could be abuse of office, power or public resources.
  • Private behaviour could raise the risk of blackmail.
  • A politician has lied or misled to protect the consequences of his or her private behaviour.

Beyond those ground rules, there is arguably another less precise but equally important operating principle: politicians in positions of higher leadership — prime ministers, premiers and cabinet ministers — should be held to higher levels of personal behaviour than other public officials.

Why? Because they are leaders, and character and integrity counts in leadership. And because higher-echelon leaders have access to more power and public resources, and should therefore be subjected to greater scrutiny.

Politicians are entitled to private lives. But when they enter public life they give up, by definition, some of their privacy and, in many cases, compromise their right to a total wall of privacy when they selectively display aspects of their private lives to boost their image.

None of which is to defend or justify the gross behaviour of certain media who invade privacy as routine practice on the basis that the worst possible penalty is that it may cost them a legal settlement long after the damage has been done.