Revelations about the involvement of two senior Labour figures in an organisation that had links with a paedophile group have elicited very different responses from the politicians concerned. One has delivered a fulsome apology; the other has expressed only regret. Here, a Catholic commentator explores the difference When is an apology not an apology? When it’s an expression of regret. An apology has a critical element of personal responsibility, taking ownership of a mistake or a wrong; regret is to deplore the wrong but to put some distance between you and it. I can’t quite recall whether it was Norman St John Stevas or Malcolm Muggeridge who, when asked whether he regretted anything, replied promptly, “The Reformation”. This wasn’t quite what the intervie