Does anyone believe Nicola Sturgeon?

[OverlyFragrant]

As per title, does anyone actually believe NS with her claims she had no idea her husband stole £400k, didn't notice the MANY luxury items just appearing around her home, and is a victim in his deceit?

What kind of a wife doesn't question her husband about stuff ? I reckon she's going down the poor victim line.

How is it plausible to look at accounts containing only £100k that you know should contain £700k and not notice the discrepancy?

Or not tell your CEO to hand the books to the treasurer when they refused? Or call in forensic accountants when your auditors quit citing likely fraud?

I do feel very sorry for her that the two men she was politically and personally closest to - Salmond and Murrell - have turned out to be such absolute shitebags. That's got to mess with your head.

Man gets caught nicking nearly half a million quids worth of stuff yet somehow we must find a way to pin this on a woman - his wife - or at least make her liable in some way.

got it

It’s not about pinning it on his wife. It’s perfectly reasonable to ask why the leader of the organisation he stole from, and that he lived with, didn’t know that he was funding his lifestyle from organisation funds. Why she didn’t initiate or allow a full forensic investigation of party finances when there were serious concerns raised about potential misappropriation of funds. It’s not about finding a way to blame the woman, it’s about accountability in public office.

Was the money being embezzled from accounts the wife signed off? And did she back up her husbands refusal to hand over the books to the company treasurer despite being his boss? Did she not call in the police or forensic accountants when the auditors resigned citing possible fraud? And was this incompetence, completely unobservant wife you know of also responsible for billions of pounds of public sector spending including huge spending cuts in local councils?

She's loathsome, manipulative, deceitful and controlling. She exploited Covid with that ridiculous daily pantomime which served no purpose other than attempting to show her in a good light. She didn't actually do anything except wait for Boris to make decisions and then do the same 2 weeks later.

She deliberately withheld information about the first Covid cases in Scotland. Ultimately deaths in Scotland were no better than in England.

She did not "co-operate fully" with the investigation. Turning up at a police station and saying "no comment" is not co-operation fully.

Are you normally so misogynistic? That you think a woman cannot be responsible for organisational finances?

She said to Laura Kuensberg that she did see the van but assumed that it belonged to a neighbour.

The question is did she know about it, not was she responsible for it.

So now she is saying she did see many of the items? I thought she said she didn’t see them?

She was responsible for the accounts they finances came out of.

Women are married to child abusers and are none the wiser until the police come knocking and find devices full of explicit images of children. Men frequently have affairs and even second families there spouses knew nothing about. Women move in men who go on to abuse their children and say they didn't know. Men lose their jobs and continue to pretend to go to work for months on end.

It's entirely possible she didn't know. They didn't share finances or have a joint account. Many of the things he bought he would be able to afford anytway. They lived very separate lives, didn't even holiday together. She was first minister, so not exactly hunting down receipts and tracking his account for every purchase. She plausibly would have thought the thing were being bought with his own money.

If dp bought us some lovely new salt and pepper grinders, there is no way on earth that I would think they'd cost anything like £2.6k, why would you?

Why is a woman being blamed for her husband criminality?

No it’s not totally implausible but as First Minister and unpopular with many she must of known she had to be absolutely whiter than white (and by extension her husband) if she has any chance of achieving her political dream an independent Scotland. So wouldn’t this mean would extra vigilant question everything? This a woman who didn’t get her hair cut during Covid restrictions so as not to look like she was breaking any rules.
Therefore, sadly (I like another poster although not completely convinced of her politics wanted to like her and thought she did an ok job during Covid) she was either naive, lacked any curiosity at all, or spectacularly dim. I have watched her makes speeches meet the public on visits to universities etc I don’t believe she naive or spectacularly dim. Did she lack any curiosity about what her husband got up too? I guess she would say she was too busy running Scotland. But somehow it just doesn’t ring true yes I can accept a couple of computer games a loo seat and some extra jars of coffee, even 1 car and maybe she didn’t know a £50 bag from a £550 bag but the sheer volume and value of the stuff he bought and not one single dull bell rang ever? And maybe the alarm bell did ring but she chose to ignore it, as many in similar situations of course have , but First Minister she was not in the position to do that.

Well she had say something, obviously. "I walked past it without noticing" rather stretches credibility TBF.

Are your neighbours in the habit of leaving a camper van in your driveway? And what do you talk to your MiL about anyway, if not things like the neighbour's brand new campervan that they've parked on her driveway?

More importantly though, she wasn't just the little wifie that didn't take an interest in her hubbie's finances. She was the leader of the party, and she refused to investigate allegations of financial irregularities. For that reason alone, she owed it to the party to pay attention to the campervan in her MiL's driveway.

Because she was his boss and was responsible for the party's accounts. Why are people acting like she was some downtrodden little thing who couldn't question the big man's personal spending?

She's also said in terms of compensation for funds nicked none of the stuff that is "hers" should be sold. There's something like £800 of Estée Lauder makeup that was initially included in the rap sheet but has been removed

Thanks for the share link to the Sunday Times article @Emilesgran .

Eye popping

Within the party Murrell was nicknamed Penfold, after Danger Mouse’s loyal hamster sidekick in the 1980s cartoon series. Meek, bespectacled and chubby, Penfold dutifully shouts “Coming, chief” whenever his superior summons him.
MacAskill suggested the similarity extended into the couple’s private life, where Murrell acted as his wife’s chauffeur and carried out the lion’s share of domestic chores. “Pete couldn’t believe his luck when he got together with Nicola,” he claimed. “He felt he was punching way above his weight and would do anything for her. He was fiercely protective of his ‘little princess’.”

I'm not even going to mention the unauthorized portrait

I have no time for Nicola Sturgeon but, to an extent, I do believe her.
I don't know how much money my husband has, nor what he spends it on - we have been together nearly 40 years, and always kept our finances separate. He had a much better-paying job than me, plus an inheritance. I have always been very happy with this arrangement, and nor does he monitor my finances. Also, if he buys hobby kit, watches, cars etc then I wouldn't really know how much they cost. So, to this extent, I believe Nicola.....
However, she will have known what her husband's salary was, and some of the purchases were household items, so harder to ignore.
But the press are missing the fundamental issue of the massive conflict of interest in having a married couple in two such powerful positions in the party. And, crucially, she was party leader.... she signed off on audited accounts without seemingly questioning where the £600k had gone - that is her real fault.
I absolutely don't believe in blaming a woman for her husband's crimes, but I do blame a person in her position who didn't properly oversee the donations from party members. She also does herself no favours in now playing the "poor little wife".
Grow up, Nicola - you had a serious job, so take some responsibility for your failure in that job.

But they couldn’t afford it, the stuff was bought with stolen money - his salary didn’t stretch to the stuff he was buying. If my DH was buying high end hair dryers, various gaming consoles and obviously expensive pens, I’d want to know how he was paying for it and we’re far from the breadline. A new car is a considered purchase, you’d ask even if just out of interest.

Great post. I agree with all you’ve written.

She said that she didn't walk past it as it was parked at the side of the house between her inlaws and her inlaws neighbours. I wouldn't give a flying fuck about a neighbours to my inlaws campervan, probs wouldn't even notice they had got one.

I absolutely believe she knew something… maybe not everything but she is either blind about what is going on under her nose, or involved in it

Neither are good attributes for someone who is leading a country. I have no time for her or her party and what they stand for, but I do feel sorry for those who gave money in good faith for it to be spent on fancy coffee machines and other ridiculous items

Many of my family members pay into the SNP and this hasn’t stopped them thinking she is amazing so unfortunately looks like nothing will taint her

So you think she was incompetent?

I don’t believe her and none of my friends up here in Scotland believe her but when speaking to colleagues in England they are tending to give her the benefit of the doubt.
I think a lot of it goes back to covid when they compared her to Boris and her pulling him up for every thing he did wrong without realising what she was like up here

For those who say she was merely totally incredibly incompetent so not noticing £600k was missing from accountants with only £100k in them was fine or not calling the police when the auditors resigned citing possible fraud… do you think her incompetence and terrible judgement was somehow magically limited only to her party role and not also to public finances and her role as FM?