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Photo by Patrick Doyle/The Canadian Press

Veteran MPP Vic Fedeli, for one brief period a contender for Brown’s job, was instead appointed as interim leader and clean-up man. He pronounced that he would “root out the rot” and then several weeks later, announced that he had.

Yet as recently as last month, explaining why he had appointed 11 candidates, Ford said he’d inherited a total “mess” from Brown.

The issue, if not a full-blown scandal, appears on the horizon as a gift for Wynne’s Liberals, by most polls last in the race, in third behind the New Democrats and with Ford solidly out front.

Coupled with other more banal difficulties — paid actors appearing as supporters at one candidate’s rally and Ford’s own peek-a-boo campaign style with the media — the story raises the spectre of a party unable to conduct an election, let alone run the province.

And such things can breathe life into faltering battles.

Until Wynne held her little scrum Thursday, it was an otherwise ordinary day on the campaign, filled with short “remarks,” photo opportunities and grip-and-grins with students.

As a colleague says, for Ford to be put in the position of having to defend the decisions and problems of his party is akin to a hockey club ahead by two goals going into the third period with a protect-the-lead mentality.

Sometimes, it works. But as often as not, it backfires.

Ford said as soon as he learned about the data theft, “We acted immediately … we’re doing an internal investigation.”

Just this once, he might want to take Wynne’s advice. This isn’t the first time complaints have been made about how the Ontario Tories run their shop; Ford himself was critical of the voting system that gave him the leadership.

Police forces stopped investigating the alleged misconduct of their own members decades ago, not because they weren’t capable of conducting such things, but because of how it looked. And if the Tories don’t want this thing to spin out of control, they ought to have some other body have a look.

• Email: cblatchford@postmedia.com | Twitter: blatchkiki