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Richard Timney, like many other men, enjoys adult entertainment. Unfortunately for him, circumstances have conspired to expose his viewing pleasures in a spectacularly public fashion.

Timney lives in the United Kingdom and subscribes to the (in this case inappropriately named) Virgin Cable service. He has a combined package for television, telephone and internet services. So far, so innocuous.

Timney works as an assistant for his wife, who herself works in Central London and often spends the night there in a second home. Because of this arrangement, Timney’s cable package is considered a claimable expense by his wife’s employers. She recently submitted a monthly bill from the cable service to claim back the costs.

Unfortunately Timney’s wife did not check through the itemised bill. And unfortunately Timney either didn’t know or had forgotten that the bill would be submitted. For Mr Timney, presumably during his wife’s absence, had watched two pay-per-view adult movies during the month in question.

What turned some potential marital embarrassment into a major scandal was that British newspapers were already interested in the expense claims of Timney’s wife. Her central London ‘home’ is a spare room in her sister’s house and, for her expenses to be acceptable, she had to argue that this was her main residence, while the house which she owns and lives in with her husband is merely a second home.

And the icing on the cake is that the media interest stems from the fact that Timney’s wife is no ordinary office worker. She is, in fact, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith – the Cabinet minister responsible for police and security issues. It’s one of the four most powerful positions in British politics, equivalent to being head of the United States Department of Homeland Security.

The moral of this story: Britain as a society does not have a major problem with gentlemen (or, indeed, ladies) watching pornographic movies in the comfort of their own home. But the British taxpayers do not seem all that keen on footing the bill.