PM didn’t know staff asked Conservative Party to pay Duffy’s expenses: spokesperson

Prime Minister Stephen Harper had no idea his staff had asked the Conservative Party to pay Sen. Mike Duffy’s ineligible expenses, his spokesperson said Sunday.

In an interview with CTV’s Question Period, Harper’s director of communications, Jason MacDonald, also said Harper didn’t know PMO staff wanted a Senate report into Duffy’s expenses sanitized, or that the party’s chief fundraiser tried to influence the independent audit of Duffy’s claims.

The problem for Stephen Harper is that, regardless of where the truth lies, he has built his reputation as a micromanager, and it now strains credibility to suggest he did not know what was going on.