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OTTAWA — Announcement, political rally, photo-op, political rally, announcement, repeat as needed.

The prime minister’s travel agenda these days is a neat package of taxpayer-paid photo opportunities paired with Conservative rallies — a popular twofer in Canadian politics.

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Tom Mulcair, leader of the official Opposition also travels across the country using his House of Commons budget.

Folks around Ottawa will say it’s been ever thus, piggybacking a political event onto one covered by the public purse. Which event was planned first is a chicken-and-the-egg type question that is never quite spelled out.

But these days the matter of what constitutes legitimate official travel for parliamentarians is facing scrutiny in an Ottawa courtroom.

Suspended Sen. Mike Duffy faces several fraud and breach of trust charges related to trips he took that involved political activities.

Among his defences is that he did attend public events during those trips to deliver speeches for the local MP — meeting local mayors or a human rights activist, for example.