The news has been coming so thick and fast of late that every week there are dozens of stories we don’t have time to linger over. Major scandals take up all our attention, only to fizzle out or be replaced by new ones. All the while there are little bits of roadkill that are at least as suggestive. Bear with me as I address one such recent fatality.

Daniel Korski was the deputy head of the No. 10 policy unit when it was David Cameron’s turn to be prime minister. Korski quit politics after the Leave vote and started a tech business. All fine and dandy. Except that then, this year, he made the fateful decision to re-enter politics, putting his name forward to be the Conservative candidate for mayor of London.

There’s a thankless task, and one which as a result should inspire a certain degree of admiration. Neither Korski nor any of the others in the running have the slightest household name recognition. Each of them stands next to zero chance of actually becoming the next mayor in the predominantly left-wing city-state of London. So it is a rather admirably kamikaze-like even to consider running for this position. But someone has to challenge Sadiq Khan, and Korski thought it could be him.

We live in strange times. On the one hand the country is beset by a libertine urge – even a satanic urge (if you look at the performances of many of the pop stars whom the public are encouraged to admire). On the other hand we seem to expect everybody – or almost everybody – in public life to have the sexual history of an especially devoted nun. In other words, we seem to have a push-me-pull-you attitude towards the whole issue.

Korski’s run for mayor came to an abrupt halt last month. He left a hustings as the news broke that the writer and producer Daisy Goodwin had publicly claimed that ten years ago in Downing Street Korski had put his hand on one of her breasts. The two had apparently met once before and Goodwin had come to Downing Street for a meeting about a possible TV show.

For his part, Korski unequivocally denied ‘any claim of inappropriate behaviour’.  But Goodwin claims that he was flirtatious throughout the meeting and that at its end, when he allegedly put his hand on her breast, she said ‘Are you really touching my breast?’, at which point he sprang away and left the room. Goodwin says that this amounted to not just ‘groping’ but ‘sexual assault’.

It is worth pausing for a moment to add one tricky but necessary piece of texture. Mr Korski is a good-looking chap, for politics. Though perhaps not as attractive as he thinks he is, he is definitely above average in wonk-world, where looks are not – nor ever should be – paramount. Goodwin, for her part, is a very attractive woman, and I suspect that her comeliness has not always been a disability in her chosen lines of work. Studies show that attractive people disproportionately advance in almost every field of employment.

Still, here is what baffles me. Even if what Goodwin says took place did take place, why does it have to be escalated to a level of ‘sexual assault’? Behaviour can be outrageous and even career-ending without necessarily being criminal.

Of course (necessary disclaimer), nobody should have to put up with unwanted harassment. But nor can we be a society which criminalises the unwanted pass. The only alternative is that everybody is allowed to make one pass at a person once in their life, and that has to be a bull’s-eye.

But ah – I hear some readers say – isn’t Korski married? The answer is that yes, he is. And what really did for him was that in a television interview conducted immediately after the allegations came to light, Korski was asked whether he has always been faithful to his wife. At this stage a more seasoned or deft politician might have said: ‘Bog off, you intrusive little snot. What business is it of yours? Do you want to tell me about your private life?’ But Korski did not do that. Instead he said: ‘Look, I mean, I have a fantastic marriage to my wife. And I’m really, you know, excited that we’ve built a fantastic family together.’ For those who wish to read between the lines, his inability to give a straight-up ‘yes’ suggested that the answer might well be ‘no’.

And that was it. Off Korski slunk, in ignominy and presumably some despair. He had entered the race to be Conservative candidate for London mayor in order to get the job and presumably do some good things for the capital. Instead, in short order, he came to public notice, was accused of sexual assault, had his career and reputation destroyed and will presumably be getting hell in the marital home to boot. That’s quite a price to pay for wishing to enter public service.

‘Well, how about not ever touching a woman’s breast without her expressly asking you to?’ you might say. And that is a perfectly respectable point of principle. Another one might be ‘Don’t be unfaithful to your wife’, and I again recognise that this is a perfectly fine rule that a lot of people live by. Yet it seems plausible that not everybody in public life will hold to those standards. Standards that – as I say – the public don’t seem that strict about themselves.

Perhaps it’s all just another part of the British public’s desire to torture our politicians: on top of everything else, we expect them to be vestal virgins. But this attitude might be one of the reasons why the number of accomplished, well-adjusted people who want to be in public life appears to plummet by the year. The rewards really aren’t that great. But the pitfalls? Oh boy.