Is Canada Worst?

We received a fascinating comment on our article, Scandal Spin. The comment was in response to our report on the Ontario’s Treasurer Sorbara stepping down from office in the face of a certain police investigation.
The commenter asserts: More public money is stolen here by our Civil Servants than in any other country on earth in total.
There is also a request for more on Canadian corruption, and I can happily direct the reader to a Canadian feature The wheel of Shame.
In our research at, Scandal Files, I honestly cannot say that the ‘perception’ of corruption in the Canadian public sector is especially outstanding.
To our uncertain knowledge, there is no objective data which would support the assertion and subjective data, in the form of Transparency International's ‘Corruption Perceptions Index’ comes no where close to supporting it.
Mind you, we gently salivate at the thought that such objective evidence might be out there somewhere.

The real issue is, however, not the level of corrupt activity, but that it should happen at any perceptible rate, in privileged democracies such as our. There can be little or no argument for need driving malfeasance, as is often the case in transition economies.
More often, those caught with their fingers on the public purse are already well rewarded for their troubles. The rest, symptomatic of the currently entrenched monetarist economics, is simply greed and avarice.
That countries such as Canada, Britain and European powers, the USA and Australia are regularly reporting this kind of corruption says little for our social development. It also reflects badly on transition economies, showing them that they are merely developing towards grander levels of public theft.
I would not be so harsh in signaling Canada out from the rest. On the other hand, we must demand better from Canada and the rest of the Western Democracies.