MPP-elect Doug Holyday was surrounded by reporters outside the mayor’s office Monday — once again defending Rob Ford’s indefensible public behaviour. Holyday used to be uncomfortable with this task. On Monday, he wore the mantle with ease.

Such is the compromised position of the deputy mayor, days before he leaves decades at city hall behind to become a partisan propagandist for a provincial political party — the Progressive Conservatives.

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The sooner Holyday leaves, the better. City residents who crave city councillors with clear, unvarnished and untainted views — even views they philosophically oppose — stopped expecting that from Holyday many months ago. The once principled mayor of Etobicoke increasingly put Ford’s political survival ahead of the city’s interests and, as such, lost his treasured independence.

Holyday’s transformation is now complete. And he’s nowhere near the admirable politician who arrived at city hall as the champion of frugality.

He’s still cheap — Etobicoke cheap; a politician who would vote down plans for a transit horse and buggy because he figures a donkey would do fine.

That’s why it was laughable to see Holyday appear with party leader Tim Hudak on Monday trumpeting subways for Toronto. That’s subways — as in the most expensive transit option; subways, as in the Eglinton subway the Mike Harris-led Conservatives buried the last time the party ruled Ontario.

But that is partisan politics for you. So, expect more incongruence from the once uncomplicated councillor. If Holyday could up and leave his Ward 3, Etobicoke Centre, office to seek a job as MPP — in the middle of the term — then everything he says in future is open to scrutiny.

Holyday made a career of railing against politicians who use city hall as a stepping stone to “higher office” with the provincial or federal governments. Now he’s done the same — sparking the same upheaval and costs to the taxpayers he excoriated numerous times.

Mayor Ford has called a council meeting for late this month to decide how to fill Holyday’s ward vacancy. A byelection might cost more than $200,000. Should a school trustee win, replacing the trustee might cost another whack of cash. The Holyday of 2004 criticized such a cascade of events as a “perversion of the system.” Politicians should never be allowed to quit for a shot at another political job, Holyday insisted.

“The public expects that they, once elected, honour that trust and complete their term,” Holyday said in a motion council rejected.

So, some might consider him a hypocrite now. It’s best he join the party, any party, where malleability is a virtue.

Mayor Ford compromised Holyday for almost three years — often leaving Holyday to defend the administration when it was clear Holyday was kept in the dark about essential policy decisions. This engendered much sympathy among the press corps. But no one needed to feel sorry for Holyday. He knew what he was getting into. He had years of evidence from viewing Ford close-up on city council. And he didn’t like much like what he saw first-hand.

Holyday reluctantly took the job as Ford’s top lieutenant. He publicly fretted about getting in bed with Ford. He said that during 10 years on city council he was unable to forge an alliance with Ford on matters of common interest.

Ford the councillor had been too unpredictable, too much of a loose cannon, too unwilling or unable to form a team in opposition to former Mayor David Miller, Holyday groused. Still, he took the job. Why? Politicians can’t resist a high-profile appointment, especially after being passed over by previous administrations.

Holyday has proved himself a loyal soldier. That attribute will serve him well at Queen’s Park, where the party leader calls the shots. But don’t expect Holyday to benefit Toronto residents in any particular way — except to insist his government spend only what it is legally mandated to spend.

When Ford is finally unmasked — his denials and lies and half-truths so exposed that only the Ford Nation acolytes prop up his empty sack — reporters will seek out Holyday to get his reaction.

Holyday will claim he was kept in the dark; that he asked questions in private but was never told the truth.

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That response may stand up as a political dodge. But if the entire collapse of the Ford administration is triggered by a tragedy in which someone is hurt by the mayor’s impaired driving or his blind refusal to be chauffeured, Holyday’s lame offerings of “I’ve never seen the mayor take a drink” will ring hollow.

Sadly, he won’t be alone. The mayor has many enablers. Holyday has been merely the highest-ranking.

Royson James usually appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Email: rjames@thestar.ca