Sturgeon insists she has nothing to hide from Salmond inquiry
NICOLA STURGEON has insisted she has nothing to hide from Holyrood’s Alex Salmond inquiry after being accused of a “sudden memory loss” that was “beyond belief”.
Holyrood Tory leader Ruth Davidson said the First Minister’s claim that she had forgotten about the key meeting at which she first learned of sexual misconduct claims against Mr Salmond was “absurd” given her famously sharp memory, and accused the SNP of “taking people for fools”.
Ms Sturgeon insisted the meeting, which she failed to tell parliament about last year, had slipped her mind, saying: “That is just how it is.”
She said she had “nothing whatsoever to hide” from the inquiry and would “relish” giving oral evidence under oath when asked to do so.
However she dodged a question on whether she thought there ought to be a judicial inquiry as well as a Holyrood one, as demanded by former SNP minister Alex Neil.
Ms Sturgeon also attacked Ms Davidson for raising the issue at FMQS after five Covid deaths were announced overnight, saying most people wanted to focus on the pandemic.
It was the second FMQS in a row at which Ms Davidson had challenged the First Minister over the Salmond affair, which is currently the subject of a crossparty Holyrood inquiry.
MSPS are looking at how the Scottish Government bungled a probe into claims of sexual misconduct made against Mr Salmond by two female civil servants in 2018, leading to him having the whole exercise set aside as flawed in a civil court action.
The Government’s mishandling of the probe left taxpayers with a bill of £512,000 for Mr Salmond’s costs.
The Tory leader pressed Ms Sturgeon over her written evidence, in which she claimed to have forgotten about the first meeting at which she learned of misconduct claims about Mr Salmond.
After Mr Salmond’s judicial review win, Ms Sturgeon told MSPS about five meetings and calls with him while he was under investigation by her officials, starting with one at her Glasgow home on 2 April, 2018, in which he laid out the claims he faced.
But Ms Sturgeon failed to mention that she was alerted to the matter four days earlier, on March 29, 2018, by Mr Salmond’s former chief of staff, Geoff Aberdein, in her Holyrood office.
That meeting only came to light at Mr Salmond’s separate criminal trial this
year – at which he was acquitted of sexual assault – and was not confirmed by the Government until this August.
In her evidence, Ms Sturgeon said: “Mr Aberdein was in Parliament to see a former colleague and while there came to see me. I had forgotten that this encounter had taken place until I was reminded of it in, I think, late January/early February 2019.”
Ms Davidson asked Ms Sturgeon if it sounded “credible” to have forgotten a meeting at which she first learned of allegations of sexual misconduct being levelled against her “predecessor and mentor of two decades”?
The First Minister said it had been the later meeting, with Mr Salmond on 2 April, that had stuck in her mind.
“That is what is seared in my memory and I think most reasonable people would understand that.”
She added: “I’m being completely open about all of this, but in the meantime I hope people will also understand I have a really important job to do as well, which is to continue to lead this country as safely as I can through a global pandemic.”
Ms Davidson said of Ms Sturgeon’s account: “This does not even bear the lightest scrutiny. It is beyond belief.”
She also contrasted Ms Sturgeon’s recollection of the meeting with another published version. which said the discussion had covered the investigation, the process of it, the fact it was a civil servant investigation being
conducted by civil servants. Ms Sturgeon said: “Other people can decide to give their own evidence, I will give mine. I have got nothing to hide.”
Ms Davidson said: “This is not a trivial matter. What lies at the heart of it is whether there was an abuse of power, which affects every citizen of this country. I am afraid that the First Minister’s position is absurd.
Ms Sturgeon said she and her government acted properly while a Tory government might have swept matters “under the carpet because they were not convenient politically”.
She also said the public would be looking at Ms Davidson’s questions in the midst of the pandemic “and saying, ‘What on earth is she thinking?’”
This does not even bear the lightest scrutiny. It is beyond belief