Telmo Languiller has done the right thing by resigning as speaker.
As he acknowledges, staying on would have inflicted further damage on the privileged office he held.
His "error of judgment" - claiming a "second residence" allowance worth almost $40,000 to live outside his city electorate in Queenscliff – was far beyond the bounds of community expectation. Simply repaying the money was never going to be enough.
But now that he has also relinquished his position, will this be enough? That depends.
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Languiller, who is a factionally significant figure in the Labor right, is not yet off the hook. Hairy questions linger.
As Premier Daniel Andrews put it on Friday, he was "entitled" to claim the money under the rules of Parliament, which stipulate only an MP must have a "home base" more than 80 kilometres from the city and maintain a second residence in Melbourne to be eligible.
Technically, that might be right. But what Languiller was not "eligible" to do, technically or otherwise, was to claim the allowance if he did not genuinely reside in Queenscliff. The Opposition seems to have its doubts.
To this end, Languiller's vehicle logs will be thoroughly examined by Parliament's audit committee.
To add to the government's woes, Fairfax Media revealed on Friday that Deputy Speaker Don Nardella also claimed a second residence allowance - this time totalling almost $113,000 over almost three years to live by the beach at Ocean Grove, rather than his Labor electorate of Melton in the outer suburbs.
On Saturday, Nardella also relinquished his position to go to the back bench. The question is, will he too repay the money, something he was refusing to do on Friday.
All of this was sparked by an investigation by Fairfax Media at the start of last week into MPs who live outside their electorates.
The expense ruckus is the last thing Mr Andrews needs right now. Labor's first two years were peppered with scandal. At the half way towards the end of 2016, the feeling in Labor ranks was the government could ill-afford further further distractions. Now we have another rather large one.
The Premier must now appoint a new speaker and deputy speaker - a process which could potentially descend into a factional brawl.
And all the while, the Premier will face extreme pressure to genuinely overhaul the woefully inadequate system of entitlements.