I’M BAILING OUT
SALMOND IN SNP RESIGNATION SENSATION
ALEX Salmond last night sensationally quit the SNP amid sexual misconduct allegations.
In an extraordinary statement that indirectly criticised Nicola Sturgeon and asked the public to fund his legal battle, the former first minister said he was resigning from the party he led for 20 years in order to clear his name.
Sturgeon later told of her “sadness about this whole situation” but insisted that the complaints against her “friend and mentor” could not be “swept under the carpet”.
The dramatic developments came as Salmond, 63, prepares to launch legal action against the Scottish Government over how they handled complaints from two women.
Salmond last night issued a statement again protesting his innocence but revealing he had resigned from the party in what he claimed was a bid to protect it from opposition attacks.
He said: “I have been a member of the Scottish National Party for 45 years, 20 of them as party leader and seven as First Minister of Scotland. I hope I have done the party and the broader cause of independence some service.
“Apart from a political spat back in the 1980s, that has been a period of continuous membership. I truly love the SNP and the wider independence movement in Scotland.
“They have been the defining commitment of my life. But today I have written to the national secretary of the party resigning my membership.”
Salmond’s lengthy statement also included thinly-veiled criticism of how First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has dealt with other disciplinary procedures.
Sturgeon, who replaced Salmond as SNP leader in 2014, suspended two former MPs, Michelle Thomson and Natalie McGarry, while other allegations of impropriety were investigated.
Salmond said: “It seems obvious that Nicola feels under pressure from other political parties to suspend me from SNP membership, given recent party precedents.
“For my part, I have always thought it a very poor idea to suspend any party member on the basis of complaints and allegations. Innocent until proven guilty is central to our concept of justice.
“However, I did not come into politics to facilitate opposition attacks on the SNP and, with Parliament returning next week, I have tendered my resignation to remove this line of opposition attack.
“Most of all, I am conscious that if the party felt forced into suspending me it would cause substantial internal division.”
On the circumstances of his own case, Salmond added: “All such issues must be treated seriously, confidentially and through a fair process.
“In this case, confidentiality has been broken greatly to my detriment and in a way which puts at serious risk the anonymity of both complainants. It urgently needs to be established who breached that duty of confidence.”
But there was an angry reaction from some in the nationalist movement at the fact Salmond also used the statement to launch a crowdfunder to