BRITAIN : Race Not Over for Ashdown : When he admitted to having an affair, the British politician braced for public outrage. But a poll finds voters in a forgiving mood.

When Paddy Ashdown, leader of Britain’s Liberal Democrats, admitted recently to having had an affair with his secretary five years ago, the disclosure was the subject of screaming headlines in the London tabloids, and senior party members nervously waited for the public response.

To their surprise and relief, the first opinion poll conducted after Ashdown made his public statement last week showed that his personal popularity had risen from 34% to 47%--while the Liberal Democrats, Britain’s third-strongest party, moved up from 13% to 15%.

Now political and social analysts are puzzling over whether the apparent public mood of forgiveness is restricted to Ashdown’s case or reflects a deeper shift in tolerance.

Much like the Americans, the British public has tended to take a dim view of hanky-panky among public officials.

“I think the British public is not as castigating as it used to be, partly because adultery has become so common in their own lives,” said Paul Johnson, a historian and social observer.

And Ashdown himself said the favorable response “says more about the British people than it says about me.”

“It says a great deal about their inherent generosity and their understanding of these matters,” he said.

Although British politicians, like officials everywhere, have had their dalliances, public exposure has usually meant political death.

In the 1960s, Defense Minister John Profumo resigned from his post and from Parliament after it was disclosed that he had had a liaison with prostitute Christine Keeler and had lied publicly about it.

In the 1970s, Lords Jellicoe and Lambton were forced to resign from government posts when their involvement with prostitutes became known. More recently, in the 1980s, Cecil Parkinson, favored as a future prime minister, had to resign from the Margaret Thatcher government when his long affair with his secretary became public knowledge.

Ashdown presented a sympathetic figure: He served as an officer with the Royal Marine Commandos for a dozen years before entering politics; at 50, he has a pleasant, outgoing manner, a 30-year marriage, a loyal wife and two children.

As an adviser to Prime Minister John Major commented: “Paddy Ashdown has had an attractive past, a broader career outside politics. It was a brief affair a long time ago. So be it.”

Another possible factor in the public mood is Ashdown’s partner in the five-month affair. His former secretary, Patricia Howard, is not the stereotypical flashy home-wrecker but rather a somewhat plain, sad-eyed, soft-spoken grandmother.

Samplings by British reporters in heavily Liberal Democrat voting areas indicated that most people were prepared to accept Ashdown’s fall from grace.

But political observers point out that it is hard to guess what effect the Ashdown affair may have on Liberal Democrats’ fortunes this year.

Then, too, analysts do not rule out a negative vote at election time by the same people who, when polled, expressed sympathy for Ashdown.

As the acerbic columnist Anne Robinson wrote in the tabloid Daily Mirror: “Mrs. Ordinary . . . rightly regards it as an act of betrayal, treachery and duplicity. She’s out there in large numbers. And sure as hell she won’t be voting for him.”