I have serious concerns: Alex Salmond on SNP chief executive’s sworn evidence
Former FM writes to MSPS
Alex Salmond has challenged the accuracy of sworn evidence given by the SNP’S chief executive to a Holyrood committee of inquiry.
Lawyers for the former first minister have written to MSPS raising “serious concerns about the veracity” of evidence given by Peter Murrell to their committee last month. The letter reveals the Crown Office has been asked to release material which, it is suggested, contradicts parts of his evidence.
The letter to MSPS investigating how the Scottish Government handled complaints against Mr Salmond concludes: “Our client is hopeful the Crown will cooperate with our request given the overwhelming public interest in this issue.”
Alex Salmond has questioned the accuracy of evidence given under oath by the SNP’S chief executive Peter Murrell to a Holyrood committee of inquiry.
His lawyers have written to the committee and the Crown Office raising “serious concerns” about the evidence of Mr Murrell to MSPS investigating how the Scottish Government handled harassment complaints against the former first minister.
The letter, sent on December 11, days after Mr Murrell spoke to the committee, says Mr Salmond is concerned about the “veracity” of “certain aspects of that evidence”. Mr Salmond’s lawyers, Levy & Mcrae, in a letter copied to every member of the Holyrood committee, said they had also written to the Crown Office to ask if material, which, they suggest, appears to contradict Mr Murrell’s evidence, will be released.
The firm, which declined to comment yesterday, wrote: “For legal reasons, we cannot divulge that material but our client is hopeful that the Crown will cooperate with our request given the overwhelming public interest in this issue.”
The concerns of Mr Salmond are not specified in the letter but his lawyers refer MSPS to a section of evidence when Mr Murrell responds to questions from Labour MSP Jackie Baillie. It includes an exchange about text messages sent by Mr Murrell, who is married to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, the day after Mr Salmond was charged with a series of sexual assaults. He told MSPS the messages to another senior party official – when he suggested it was a good time to be pressurising police investigating the former first minister and “the more fronts he is having to firefight on the better” – had been clumsily worded and was not evidence of a conspiracy against Mr Salmond. Mr Murrell was asked by Ms Baillie, Scottish Labour deputy l eader, “whether there were other text messages to any other party official on the same subject”. He replied: “No. Not that I am aware of.”
He was also asked to repeat under oath that he had conferred with SNP compliance manager Ian Mccann and the party’s chief operating officer Sue Ruddick “and that no other relevant information was found”. He replied: “There is nothing else. No.”
He told MSPS the text messages had been “quite out of character” and indicated “just how upset I was at the time”.
The Crown Office has warned Mr Salmond’s lawyers that material obtained while preparing for his criminal trial last year cannot be released to the committee despite legal proceedings ending when the former first minister was acquitted after a High Court trial last year. Meanwhile, supporters of Mr Salmond have suggested the Crown may be abusing its power after ordering Police Scotland to investigate the alleged leak of Mr Murrell’s text messages. Mr Salmond was awarded more than £ 500,000 in legal expenses after the Scottish Government admitted there had been a “failure” in how the complaints against
him had been handled. In a subsequent trial in March, he was cleared of 13 charges, which he had denied, including sexual assaults and attempted rape. His allies believe opponents had attempted to use the allegations against him to block any return to frontline politics.
Mr Murrell has been SNP chief executive for 20 years and married to Ms Sturgeon since 2010. He and Mr Salmond have known each other for nearly four decades. After Mr Salmond first appeared in court on charges in January 2019, Mr Murrell sent messages to a senior party official appearing to call for pressure to be put on police over Mr Salmond’s case. One message said “folk should be asking the police questions”.
In their letter to MSPS, Mr Salmond’s lawyers also raise his concern about the number of witnesses, including senior civil servants, who have needed to “clarify” their evidence after appearing before the committee in person. This, they say, “seems highly irregular to our client”.
M r Mu r r e l l w a s already facing further questions from MSPS relating to the evidence he gave last month. He has been asked in a letter by committee chair Linda Fabiani to clarify some of the evidence to the committee, including his knowledge of when Mr Salmond was coming to his home to meet Ms Sturgeon. He told the committee he was “not really aware” Mr Salmond was meeting his wife in the couple’s house on April 2, 2018, but appeared to contradict himself when he later said: “I think at some point on the previous day I was aware that Alex was coming to the house.”
Mr Murrell also said he was not present at the meeting, but later said he arrived home “not long before the meeting ended”.
At the meeting, Mr Salmond discussed t he co m p l a i n t s against him with Ms Sturgeon. It remains unclear whether she believed the meeting was party or government business with Mr Salmond. Mr Murrell told MSPS it was not party business but government business that should have been formally diaried and minuted.
Mr Murrell has also been asked to confirm whether he has ever used the messaging service Whatsapp “including any communications with SNP officials or party members on anything related to concerns about the former first minister and the timescales for such exchanges”.
He told MSPS that he does not use Whatsapp. However, it later emerged that an account linked to Mr Murrell’s mobile number displayed him as “last seen” in November.
MSPS on the committee have repeatedly complained about some of the evidence submitted by witnesses. In November, Ms Fabiana said that some of it lacked “detail and indeed usefulness”, which was both “deeply problematic and deeply disrespectful”. She said “t he del a y, the prevarication and obfuscation” must end for the committee to fulfil the role it had been given by parliament. She has also expressed frustration at the Scottish Government’s “continual delays” over the publication of its legal advice relating to Mr Salmond’s case. Mr Salmond is due to appear before the committee on January 19 and Ms Sturgeon the following week.
At First Minister’s Questions on December 10, she accused opposition politicians of trying to use her husband as a “weapon” against her and indulging in “wild conspiracy theories”. Opposition politicians have said that she should resign as first minister if she is shown to have misled parliament and broken the Scottish ministerial code.
Our client hopes the Crown will cooperate with our request given the public interest in this issue