The news that the Labour MPs accused of fiddling their parliamentary expenses, David Chaytor, Elliot Morley and Jim Devine, have been granted legal aid to defend the charges against them sparked an outcry, with the leaders of all three major parties falling over themselves to denounce it.Tory leader David Cameron said it was a ‘complete outrage’ and promised to review the system if his party formed a government after the election.

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said the public would be dismayed that taxpayers’ money was being spent to defend the cases.

And prime minister Gordon Brown said the three would have to repay the funds, though how he could enforce this is not clear.

The three were granted legal aid under the interests of justice test that currently applies for granting legal aid to people charged with matters that will be heard in the Crown court.

Law Society chief executive Des Hudson defended the principle of granting legal aid for those charged with criminal offences, saying: ‘It is a principle of our legal system that anyone charged with a criminal offence before the Crown court is entitled to legal representation.

‘This is a vital part of ensuring that charges against a defendant must be fully proved in a fair trial. This must require the provision of legal aid.’

He added: ‘It would be very worrying indeed if a fellow citizen charged with serious criminal matters could not be properly represented in court. Stigmatising the legal aid system is disappointing and unhelpful.’

Indeed, attacking the legal aid system over this case seems absurd. Just because public funding is available, people charged with criminal offences are not obliged to use it. The three could have chosen to pay privately for lawyers to run their defence, as the Tory peer Lord Hanningfield, who also faces charges, has done.

In any event, the rules are being amended in a couple of months’ time, when means testing for eligibility will be introduced nationally for Crown court cases, so that those who can afford to pay for or make a contribution towards their defence costs will have to do so.

If the MPs had been charged a few weeks later they would in all likelihood not have been granted legal aid.

The fuss made about the case by the three parties is surely just a cheap shot at headline grabbing on the subject of MPs’ expenses, which they know rankles with the public, not an earnest attempt to tackle the problems of the legal aid system. If only they would devote their energy to that one.