Any notion that Britain itself was keen to lock up the general should have vanished with the revelation that he had been visiting Britain not only to mend his bad back but also as the guest of a British arms maker, Royal Ordnance.

ECONOMIST: General Pinochet

Thursday's revelation is the latest spending embarrassment for the General Services Administration.

CNN: GSA finds more than $250,000 spent on one-day event

That was followed by the revelation he had authorised the leaking of the solicitor general's letter to Mr Heseltine, in which the former defence secretary was warned of a material inaccuracy in a letter he had sent to a merchant bank about Westland.

BBC: Brittan returns to Parliament as peer

Then, probably the most damaging, was the revelation that Mr Mandelson had been given a preferential loan by millionaire paymaster general Geoffrey Robinson to allow him to buy an upmarket home he couldn't otherwise afford.

BBC: How sleaze entered the political dictionary

The controversy surrounding the loans began with the revelation that a number of millionaires who loaned Labour large sums around the time of last year's general election were subsequently nominated by Tony Blair for seats in the House of Lords.

BBC: NEWS | UK | UK Politics | Clarke accused in ?14m loans row