Comment: So where's the money gone, Ken?

The resignation came after three months in which the Standard has revealed not only concerns about the way he administered LDA money but the failure by his staff to declare foreign travel - questions that now apply to Mr Jasper himself. The final straw appears to have been emails we published yesterday showing a close, but undisclosed, relationship between Mr Jasper and Karen Chouhan, a senior figure in two organisations which received a total of £100,000 in grants from the GLA - a clear conflict of interest.

Mr Jasper always refused to give any explanation for his actions and has invariably resorted instead to accusing this paper of racism. And it is easier for him to blame, as he did yesterday, "the racist nature of a relentless media campaign" than answer the very specific allegations against him. But there are now police investigations into six organisations that received LDA grants at Mr Jasper's behest.

The apparent misuse of public money is a matter for all the people of London. London council-tax payers are people of every colour; we all require probity from public servants like Mr Jasper. Indeed, many of the individuals who have shared their concerns with this paper about the behaviour of Mr Jasper's associates have themselves been from ethnic minority communities. Playing the race card will not work.

The task of explaining these grants now falls squarely to Mr Livingstone. Mr Jasper has gone, but taxpayers' money remains unaccounted for. The Mayor has admitted that his initial claim that there was a "full audit trail with chapter and verse on how the money's been spent" for the grant payments was not accurate. But Mr Livingstone faces a bigger question too: explaining how a culture of financial irregularities appears to have become accepted in Mr Jasper's office. Earlier this week, the BBC showed he took a flight in the US paid for by a company called Virtcom, which had itself received £40,000 from the LDA; Mr Jasper's deputy, Rosemary Emodi, resigned in January after lying over a free trip to Nigeria.

The Jasper affair raises questions for the Assembly too. It was inexcusably slow in examining the Standard's allegations, allowing Mr Jasper to escape any proper internal scrutiny. Nor have Assembly members covered themselves in glory in letting the irregularities take place at all. Much of the material published by the Standard was in the public domain: it must be asked why no one on the Assembly appears to have noticed that anything was awry.

But most of all it is Mr Livingstone who must now answer the hard questions raised about the conduct of his close associate and the administration he leads. It is not good enough to blame, as he did last night, a "disgraceful campaign" for Mr Jasper's resignation. Until he actually addresses the question of what happened to the disputed grants, this affair will overshadow his office's good name.