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The more one delves into the trove of emails entered as evidence in the Mike Duffy trial, the more apparent it becomes that the infamous $90,000 cheque from Nigel Wright to the errant Conservative senator was not the sum of the scandal: it was merely the means to an end. Or rather, several ends.

One part of it was evidently to secure Duffy’s cooperation in the scheme to minimize and misrepresent his abuse of the Senate housing allowance, in which he was to be cast as an honourable man who, having claimed these expenses in good faith and without clear guidance from Senate rules, was nevertheless repaying them out of his own pocket. But it was equally intended to preserve him from the scrutiny of a Senate audit.

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The secret payment to a sitting legislator by the prime minister’s former chief of staff has understandably attracted most of the attention: it is, after all, at the heart of the fraud and breach of trust case against Duffy. The attempt to tamper with the audit, if it is mentioned at all, is treated as a secondary matter. But it is clear from the emails that the effort to pay off Duffy’s expenses was driven as much by the audit as by any other concern. And that understanding helps to explain one of the central mysteries of the case.