The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Calls for Sturgeon to sack husband
Nicola Sturgeon has been urged to sack her husband, Peter Murrell, as SNP chief executive after he admitted to sending WhatsApp messages appearing to back police action against Alex Salmond.
Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said Mr Murrell’s position was “completely untenable” following the revelation and urged him to quit.
Mr Murrell is understood to have confirmed he sent the electronic messages but regretted the way they were worded.
Sources familiar with the situation confirmed Mr Murrell has acknowledged he sent the messages, after the Daily Record reported the SNP chief executive had made the admission.
The chief executive of the governing party has admitted sending messages calling for the police to be pressured into action against their former boss, Alex Salmond.
Last week Ms Sturgeon refused to give a direct answer when asked by Ruth Davidson at First Minister’s Questions if the WhatsApps were genuine.
During an uncomfortable exchange for the first minister, Ms Sturgeon said she did not think it was reasonable for her to be asked questions about things that “other people might or might not have done”.
Mr Ross said: “The chief executive of the governing party has admitted sending messages calling for the police to be pressured into action against their former boss, Alex Salmond.
“This is a shattering, extraordinary revelation and leaves Peter Murrell’s position as chief executive of the SNP completely untenable.
“We must now be told what Nicola Sturgeon and Scottish Government ministers knew about these messages.
“Had they seen them? Did they know about them?
“Were they asked to pressure the police?
“Nicola Sturgeon has to take responsibility. This is her government, her party, and it’s up to her to do the right thing and immediately act. She oversees the actions of the SNP chief executive. There is nobody else to blame.”
Mr Ross added: “The first minister must sack Peter Murrell or her judgment is gone.”
The SNP has been approached for comment.
The messages came to light when they were received by SNP MP Kenny Mac As kill from an anonymous source.
The WhatsApps appear to have been sent after Mr Salmond had appeared in court charged with sexual offences. The former first minister was cleared of all charges earlier this year.
The timing of their sending was also during the month that a separate complaint was made about Mr Salmond to the Metropolitan Police, an investigation the London force later dropped.
The first WhatsApp message read: “Totally agree folk should be asking the police questions... report now with the PF on charges which leaves police twiddling their thumbs. So good time to be pressurising them. Would be good to know Met looking at events in London.”
T he second message read: “TBH the more fronts he is having to firefight on the better for all complainers. So CPS action would be a good thing.”
The Daily Record suggested that Mr Murrell’s position on the first message is that he wanted individuals to direct any questions they had to the police.
Meanwhile, in the second he meant that all allegations should be investigated. But it is understood he feels he could have expressed himself better.
The Conservative MSP Oliver Mundell did himself no favours when he called Nicola Sturgeon a liar in the Scottish Parliament last week.
The “l” word is deemed unparliamentary, in Westminster as well as Holyrood, and breaching the protocol is punishable by exclusion, something Mundell would have known.
However, at risk to his own reputation, he decided it was time to shine a brighter light on the murky goings-on at the heart of the SNP government.
There is growing frustration among MSPs on all sides of the political divide over the first minister’s refusal to comply with the inquiry into the Alex Salmond case.
To recap, she vowed last year to make available any documents requested by the committee investigating her government’s botched handling of allegations against Salmond. But it turns out that her promise was merely a ploy to deflect attention away from a process which cost the taxpayer more than £500,000 and exposed what Salmond claimed was the bias of her inner circle.
Of course, since then we have had the former first minister’s trial and acquittal on sex charges earlier this year, and the subsequent bitter fallout between the Salmond and Sturgeon camps.
Against the backdrop of a global pandemic, Sturgeon perhaps hoped she could evade the scrutiny of a committee headed by a member of her own party, Linda Fabiani. But her lack of co-operation, withholding key evidence and hiding behind legal arguments has created mounting unease over her integrity.
Matters came to a head last week when Sturgeon refused to confirm, or deny, the authenticity of messages sent by her husband, Peter Murrell, also the SNP’s chief executive, apparently urging action against Salmond following his first court appearance.
It is surely inconceivable that she wouldn’t have known the level of Murrell’s involvement, and her wriggling, under questioning from Ruth Davidson, confirmed fears that the incestuous marriage of party and government within Sturgeon’s own household would one day end in tears. Even Scottish Nationalist sympathisers have worried that transparency would be forfeited by such an arrangement and calls for Murrell’s resignation are long overdue.
However, the defenestration of her partner (professionally not personally) would not let Sturgeon off the hook.
Fabiani has quite rightly suspended the inquiry’s proceedings until she receives the responses it seeks from those in power. And the clamour for the truth is being joined by one-time allies, such as Noel Dolan, Sturgeon’s special adviser when she was deputy first minister. To Mundell’s cries of “liar”, Dolan accused his old boss of “making a mockery” of Fabiani’s committee and undermining the parliament for refusing to provide requested information.
Sturgeon’s approach when under fire is to affect outrage and accuse her inquisitors of asking the wrong questions. So far, she has emerged largely unscathed, especially during her daily Covid briefings, where she shrugs off journalists trying to hold her to account.
But in going back on her word to the parliament over the Salmond inquiry she is on shakier ground. The only conclusion now being drawn from her blocking tactics is that she has something to hide.
How will this all end? With the government’s continued obfuscation, little
progress will be made by Fabiani and her team. This risks the inquiry being dragged out, possibly until next spring, which would be of more benefit to the opposition than the nationalists, who won’t want their dirty laundry washed in public so close to the Scottish elections.
Of more immediate concern for Sturgeon, though, is the question of trust. Her prevarications over the Salmon probe will inevitably lead to an erosion of faith not just in her government, her advisers and her party machine, but in her own credibility.
Already, her authority has been challenged over the sorry episode of Margaret Ferrier, who would not give up her seat despite being ordered to do so by the SNP leader.
Sturgeon is now determined to impose stricter Covid restrictions on the longsuffering Scottish public, extending measures nationwide, possibly for months.
However, public tolerance for further constraints that have limited scientific
justification will depend heavily on the government’s standing among voters.
Sturgeon won widespread compliance in March when the entire nation grouped together in the face of the pandemic. Today much has changed, with more known about the disease and people starting to question the draconian curbs.
Mass obedience is not guaranteed as businesses go bust and lives are put on hold again. Just when she is about to need it most, Sturgeon is destroying public trust in her leadership.
Mass obedience is not guaranteed as.... lives are put on hold again