Prime Minister Stephen Harper strode into office in 2006 promising “open, honest, accountable” governance. Seven years later, Canadians are gagging at the memory of that pledge.

What exactly is the public to make of the startling revelation that Harper’s chief of staff quietly cut Conservative senator Mike Duffy a cheque for $90,000 to help bail him out of a Senate scandal over improper housing expenses? Why is Nigel Wright, the man who runs the Prime Minister’s Office, personally bankrolling a truant Harper appointee in the midst of a Senate investigation into alleged abuse of taxpayers’ money? And how on Earth could Harper not know?

This puts the Conservative government’s rush to praise Duffy for his “leadership” in repaying the wrongly claimed expenses in a decidedly different light. Ditto for the Tory effort to declare the case closed on the senator’s expenses.

As New Democratic Party ethics critic Charlie Angus put it, a “dark cloud of ethical failures” hangs over the PMO and it isn’t going away. This calls for an independent investigation. Rightly, ethics commissioner Mary Dawson is looking into the matter. The arrangement raises suspicion of “unethical behaviour and cover-ups” in high places, Angus says. Certainly, it looks like a bid to quietly minimize the damage of a politically embarrassing scandal.

Faced with a Duffy-style problem of paying back wrongfully claimed expenses, most Canadians would have raided their savings, passed the hat round the family, called up a bank manager for a loan or begged for time to repay. Few would have thought to tap the Prime Minister’s top staffer for help. Sen. Duffy appears to be lucky in his friends.

This of course follows the controversy over whether Duffy is qualified to represent Prince Edward Island in the Senate in the first place, given that he doesn’t live there. There was also concern as to whether Sen. David Tkachuk, who chairs the committee on internal economy, tipped off Duffy about the contents of an audit report before it was completed.

There seems to be no end to this scandal; every fresh revelation raises the question of Duffy’s fitness to sit in the Red Chamber.

According to Harper’s staff, Canadians can rest assured that Harper knew nothing of the Wright/Duffy arrangement, and no taxpayer money was involved. But that’s hardly an end to it.

What about the Senate Conflict of Interest Code? It says “neither a Senator, nor a family member, shall accept, directly or indirectly, any gift or other benefit, except compensation authorized by law, that could reasonably be considered to relate to the Senator’s position.” The code also says senators must disclose all gifts or benefits over $500 within 30 days.

Canadians deserve better than this. A lot better.

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