Responding to the stunning admission of his caucus colleague Svend Robinson this week, NDP MP Lorne Nystrom says he doesn't expect the incident to affect his party's re-election chances.

"It is a personal tragedy," Nystrom said in an interview with CTV's Question Period on Sunday.

"All of us, under certain circumstances, crack and do something that's really strange and weird."

In a tearful news conference on Thursday, Robinson, a 25-year NDP member of Parliament, admitted "pocketing" an expensive piece of jewelry at a public auction the week before.

As he spoke of his misdeed, Robinson said he would be taking medical leave, and, in the meantime, stepping aside from his campaign for re-election in the suburban Vancouver riding of Burnaby-Douglas.

Although that decision has sparked a national debate over how Robinson's crime is handled, the auction house has already declared it won't be pressing criminal charges. Whether Robinson is ultimately charged is up to Len Doust, a special prosecutor appointed Friday by the B.C. government.

According to Nystrom, Robinson is doing the right thing for his own welfare. And the fallout won't taint the party nationally.

"It only affects politics in terms of that particular riding," Nystrom told Question Period. "Which means we have to find a new candidate if the election comes in the next few weeks."

Unconcerned that the political fallout could harm his party's re-election chances elsewhere, Nystrom said Robinson's problems are absolutely personal.

"I don't know what the particular problems are, but they are deeply personal," he said.

"I have known him very well for 25 years and he is not the same Svend Robinson that I knew just a short while ago."

According to Nystrom, who faced his own shoplifting charge in 1990, says it's "hard to comment" on whether Robinson should be charged.

In my case," Nystrom said, recalling the time he forgot to pay for one of a few items he needed as he rushed to the airport, "It was just a quick case of distraction and a charge was laid and I was acquitted."

"But this is totally different. It's a case where he did something that was wrong and he knows he did it."