Don’t pick and choose what you tell Salmond inquiry, government cautioned

Scotland’s top civil servant and the Deputy First Minister have jointly refused to release legal advice given to the government over its bungled handling of a sexual harassment inquiry into former First Minister Alex Salmond, prompting MSPS to warn them against attempting to “pick and choose” what evidence is published. Leslie Evans, who leads the Scottish civil service, and John Swinney have both rejected demands for the guidance to be made available to the Scottish Parliament committee which today officially launches an investigation into the government’s actions in relation to sexual misconduct allegations made against Mr Salmond during his time in office.

The refusal to release legal guidance sets up a likely clash between Ms Evans and MSPS when she appears before it as the first witness.

The specially-convened committee, chaired by SNP MSP Linda Fabiani, had written to the government asking for more transparency over the legal advice it received when Mr Salmond took it to the Court of Session over

how it conducted its inquiry into his actions. The judicial review forced ministers to admit the government probe had been unfair, unlawful and “tainted by apparent bias” and resulted in the Scottish Government paying out more than £500,000 to Mr Salmond.

Despite the case being a key part of the committee inquiry, the government has refused to release any of the legal and court papers related to the case, citing legal privilege.

Last week Ms Fabiani wrote to the government urging it to waive privilege and cooperate in the interests of full transparency. However, in letters received by the committee yesterday from Ms Evans and Mr Swinney, the government has refused to budge as revealing the advice would be “inappropriate”.

Mr Swinney said: “In order to ensure the good government referred to in the Scottish ministerial code, it is important that ministers and officials can seek legal advice whenever they need to and that legal advice can be freely provided by legal advisers to the Scottish Government; these exchanges must be full and frank to be of value.

“If the Scottish Government were to waive privilege it would undermine this ability on future occasions when ministers and officials choose to seek legal advice and would impact negatively on when and how legal advice is provided. This would not be in the interests of good government and the upholding of the rule of law.”

In her letter Ms Evans states: “In accordance with usual practice, the Scottish Government is not disclosing the internal processes of taking and receiving legal advice or the scope and nature of any requests for legal advice or any legal advice provided.”

However, Murdo Fraser MSP, one of the Scottish Conservative representatives on the committee, said: “Enough has been hidden behind closed doors in SNP government corridors. The committee cannot fulfil its function without full transparency. If we only receive part of the evidence, we will only be able to produce part of an inquiry report. The Scottish public want scrutiny, not more secrecy. Nicola Sturgeon and Leslie Evans can’t pick and choose what evidence the inquiry gets to see.”

Both Mr Swinney and Ms Evans objected to the committee’s demand for written and oral evidence from civil servants, claiming that officials giving “personal reflections or private opinions” about government matters would be “entirely contrary” to civil service practice.

The move potentially sets up another clash over whether Nicola Sturgeon’s chief of staff, Liz Lloyd, can give evidence. The committee is also investigating whether Ms Sturgeon broke the Scottish ministerial code by staying in contact with Mr Salmond while her officials were investigating him.