Salmond v Sturgeon round 4. What next?

[Cismyfatarse]

New thread.

It's quite something that the SNP NEC failed to heed the advice/wake up call by a qualified QC on the course of conduct by members of the SNP. How typical that instead of heeding the wake up call intended, the response was instead to apparently discredit the messenger. It does make you wonder who felt so strongly that caution & cool heads didn't prevail.

Wow. David Davis didn't mince his words. Full text of his speech in the Spectator. www.spectator.co.uk/article/david-davis-scotland-a-deficit-of-power-and-accountability

On bbc 1 news now

I missed it live but reading the BBC article this morning it is just way too “implicit”. I’m trying to think of the right word, but if you read it it just leaves you thinking “So what? Why is that so bad?” It’s all quite factual but still leaves the reader to piece together the myriad of information to come to the grand conclusion that NS and the SNP are utterly corrupt. Most people aren’t interested enough to put the effort in to get themselves to a conclusion. We need much more explicit reporting on a topic as complex as this.

A thousand seemingly innocuous transgressions...feels like death by a thousand cuts. The people of Scotland don’t care what’s happening because it al feels like lots and lots of low level sniping at NS. It’s the aggregate picture that is astonishing, that I feel most people will never get to.

Come on Scottish journalists!!! Here is a challenge for you. Use your craft to MAKE PEOPLE SEE AND UNDERSTAND!

@TheShadowyFeminist

It's quite something that the SNP NEC failed to heed the advice/wake up call by a qualified QC on the course of conduct by members of the SNP. How typical that instead of heeding the wake up call intended, the response was instead to apparently discredit the messenger. It does make you wonder who felt so strongly that caution & cool heads didn't prevail.

Yes, and it’s a million times worse as they are the government and using public funds to pursue a case they were advised to drop.

If they’d been legally aided, for example, the funding would have been withdrawn.

I was also unaware the expenses had been awarded on a scale to reflect their behaviour. It’s outrageous.

Ronswan stayed up to watch the BBC ans STV news coverage. Huge amount of "nothing to see here, moving swiftly along" going on. However I don't think this is going away. Follow up statement from Douglas Ross.

twitter.com/Douglas4Moray/status/1371928056856780805?s=20

Douglas Ross said: “If the First Minister’s side were aware of complaints against Alex Salmond in February 2018, an outrageous breach of those women’s privacy and confidentiality has occurred.

“February 2018 is also two months before Nicola Sturgeon originally claimed to find out about complaints. If her chief of staff knew then, and was interfering in the investigation, it blows another enormous hole in the First Minister’s story.“If civil servants said the First Minister’s chief of staff was interfering in the investigation in a ‘very bad’ way, then that is a sacking offence. It raises serious questions about how she tried to interfere, how she found out, who told her, when she knew, and who she went on to tell.

“It further raises the question if anyone told Nicola Sturgeon that her chief of staff was interfering in the investigation. If they did, a number of lies have been told to the Scottish Parliament. If they didn’t, it still makes Nicola Sturgeon’s story of when she claims to have found out about complaints even more implausible.

“These are all ‘ifs’. We need Nicola Sturgeon to immediately confirm or deny these new allegations, and to agree to release the evidence that has been cited this week.”

Quoted here. www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/tory-mp-david-davis-suggests-23741508

It's still quite complex and the reporting quite subtle. I think they're used to politicians exaggerating and the truth being a toned down version whereas actually, because he was trying to obey court orders despite parliamentary privilege, DD was actually not going as far as he probably could have.

It is quite complex to understand I am finding

Davies also spoke about an email which was missing ?

And why information was being redacted and why the enquiry committee was having so much trouble to get information from SG

I think he mentioned a couple of emails, not 100% sure but I think he talked about one that was removed from the court evidence (I think this might be the one which showed an email autofill data breach where they included someone not involved in an email chain then redacted the whole thing to hide it) and another was the email between two people (Barbara Allison was one, other might have been nicky?) about the first minister's chief of staff interfering in the investigation

Sorry just checked and the second person on the email was Judith McK - the investigating officer

It’s very complex. I don’t understand. I can’t keep up with all the names of those involved. I’m bored of all this fixation on dates of when/if NS knew of goings on - what’s the big deal of a week here or there? I’m bored of seeing AS’ face knowing that yes, he was acquitted of all charges but yes, it’s bloody clear he was a man you wouldn’t want to be left alone in a room with as a female. And why is the magnificent Joanna Cherry standing up for him?

To outsiders it all looks incredibly nit-picky (but obviously there are important details of Ministerial Codes and the like)

There definitely looks like there is/was a culture in the SNP that is seedy and misogynistic but that NS has managed to navigate her way through to power and has either tried to destroy the reputation of her former mentor or he is trying to destroy hers.

I really do need a journalist to clearly explain in non-political language what’s going on. Everything I read seems to presume a high level of knowledge of who is who, how the power structures are supposed to work and a knowledge of Holyrood systems and procedures. I have some of that but obviously not enough to make me fully understand.

And now DD and Westminster have got involved and are allowed to say something because of some arcane ‘parliamentary privilege’ - what’s that when it’s at home???

The dates issue; at minimum if true it means Nicola Sturgeon lied to parliament on multiple occasions. That is in breach of the ministerial code - they're not supposed to mislead parliament and if they do so unintentionally they are supposed to correct it as soon as they know. This also didn't happen quickly even after she was "reminded" of the earlier meeting.

But the dates issue also causes problems in terms of the whole investigation as the procedure they drew up has no involvement for the First Minister until concluded so if she knew earlier then how and why did she know? Who told her? This relates to the issue David Davis raised about her chief of staff who (he claims) was interfering with the investigation. This person is one of those who Salmond accuses of setting him up so this involvement is important.

Parliamentary privilege means that when speaking in Westminster, David Davis does not have to worry about breaching court orders such as the lifelong anonymity order around the identity of the complainants in the criminal case. He didn't actually breach it in any obvious way IMO but this order is a problem for the Holyrood committee as at least some of the complainants appear im the narrative in other contexts. This is causing lots of evidence to be redacted. Holyrood does not have the same Parliamentary privilege as Westminster and in this case it is seriously hampering their investigations, which is why DD spoke up

@RonSwan

On bbc 1 news now

I missed it live but reading the BBC article this morning it is just way too “implicit”. I’m trying to think of the right word, but if you read it it just leaves you thinking “So what? Why is that so bad?” It’s all quite factual but still leaves the reader to piece together the myriad of information to come to the grand conclusion that NS and the SNP are utterly corrupt. Most people aren’t interested enough to put the effort in to get themselves to a conclusion. We need much more explicit reporting on a topic as complex as this.

A thousand seemingly innocuous transgressions...feels like death by a thousand cuts. The people of Scotland don’t care what’s happening because it al feels like lots and lots of low level sniping at NS. It’s the aggregate picture that is astonishing, that I feel most people will never get to.

Come on Scottish journalists!!! Here is a challenge for you. Use your craft to MAKE PEOPLE SEE AND UNDERSTAND!

I agree with you, and also with voteinvain! I've been following these threads since "the beginning" and it has helped me so much to have it set out in idiots terms for me... (so thanks !). Though I'm still often confused at new information arising and how it fits into the bigger picture. It does worry me, because even I can see there's something dodgy going on, but my grasp of it still feels so tenuous. I can totally see that anyone who hasn't been following it, and getting "dripfed" information as it arises and is reported will just be thinking "meh... they're trying to discredit NS before an election, but she hasn't done anything tangibly and obviously wrong that I can see". The "what lie did she tell?" approach.

I don't think, for me, it's even whether NS or AS is "right" any more. Or even if the ministerial code has been broken or whatever. It's just that there seems to be a total disregard amongst the SG at the highest levels for being open and transparent... for providing information when asked by their own officers/ lawyers, or for attempting to carry out their own processes fairly and without bias. It's just horrible and sleazy, and I can't understand why it is bypassing so many. (Well, I can understand, for the reasons mentioned above... but I don't like it).

And I'm really ignorant of the whole political and governmental system in Scotland and how things all link together - so if I smell something off it must be reeeeeally bad! I don't have a clue who the complainants are BTW, and I do fear that if someone told me, I wouldn't have heard of them

he talked about one that was removed from the court evidence

I think this was an email that was the reason Salmond's side were able to say to the judge that they were not satisfied that the government had complied with their duty to the court to disclose all relevant material. What I hadn't realised when looking through the legal advice was that this had already been given clearance by the Scotgov solicitor who was responsible for ensuring all relevant evidence was passed on in accordance with the court order for disclosure. It was removed by someone else & that caused huge issues for their external counsel & resulted in the commission & diligence order (which the LA directed to Evans office).

It was a deliberate omission which cost ££££, and was apparently explained via the mistaken cc of someone who wasn't involved (another data leak). DD I think mentioned this was a sackable offence, yet no one was sacked.

In layman’s terms?

The SG acts as it pleases. The Crown Office is unaccountable and threatens MSPs with prosecution if they discuss evidence which is freely available in England and Wales without sanction.

The top tier of government and the prosecution service appear corrupt. God help Scotland if it does not realise that the SNP act like gangsters and will do as they please unless they are voted out. That’s literally the only mechanism that exists to deal with this short of the UK Government rewriting devolution or cutting the relevant powers it’s given to Holyrood.

It does seem to be too subtle for the average voter to appreciate how bad all this is. The reporting in Scotland has been woeful.

From the House of Commons website: ‘Parliamentary privilege grants certain legal immunities for Members of both Houses to allow them to perform their duties without interference from outside of the House. Parliamentary privilege includes freedom of speech and the right of both Houses to regulate their own affairs.’

It’s a very important and necessary part of our democratic process, sadly lacking in the Scottish system as is.

Parliamentary privilege means that when speaking in Westminster, David Davis does not have to worry about breaching court orders such as the lifelong anonymity order around the identity of the complainants in the criminal case. He didn't actually breach it in any obvious way IMO but this order is a problem for the Holyrood committee as at least some of the complainants appear im the narrative in other contexts. This is causing lots of evidence to be redacted. Holyrood does not have the same Parliamentary privilege as Westminster and in this case it is seriously hampering their investigations, which is why DD spoke up

This is the question the Spectator took back to court, wasn’t it ?

The SG take the order to mean that you can’t mention the name of any of the complainants in any context at all.

The Spectator - and Lady Dorrian - said this was nonsense, you only have to not mention their names if discussing them as complainers.

There has been the suggestion that one of the complainers joined the case with a false allegation so that - under the broad interpretation - she could be protected from any questions about what she did in the run-up to the criminal prosecution. I think that’s utterly disgraceful if true.

Yes, that's basically what the Spectator went to court over. It didn't resolve the issue fully though and redactions were still made

@LexMitior

In layman’s terms?

The SG acts as it pleases. The Crown Office is unaccountable and threatens MSPs with prosecution if they discuss evidence which is freely available in England and Wales without sanction.

The top tier of government and the prosecution service appear corrupt. God help Scotland if it does not realise that the SNP act like gangsters and will do as they please unless they are voted out. That’s literally the only mechanism that exists to deal with this short of the UK Government rewriting devolution or cutting the relevant powers it’s given to Holyrood.

This is the level of the scandal. Or at least one very strong arm of it, that DD laid out and called explicitly for the separation of powers to deal with. I despair of most journalists covering this, they wouldn't know a story if it bit them on the bum. The vagueness seems complicit. It must be. Why purposely muddy a clear story if you don't have to.

I agree. Yes the story is complex but it's not incomprehensible. You don't really need to understand all the details, or who's who in the civil service (although it adds dimension) to get it. But journalists seem to not be willing to grasp this nettle

So she doesn't want to talk about Salmond in today's briefing?

Someone's changed their tune!

The brass neck of the woman!

Yes the supine tv media not going after this does show exactly why separation of powers, checks and balances is so important. Can't always rely on the third estate.

My Twitter is full or 'but Johnson is worse' is that the standard?

@anon444877

Yes the supine tv media not going after this does show exactly why separation of powers, checks and balances is so important. Can't always rely on the third estate.

My Twitter is full or 'but Johnson is worse' is that the standard?

Yep, my SNP loving friend just keeps posting that Tories are worse and people saying anything to divert and stir shit on poor nicola....

I can't even go there.

Yes, "but the Tories" is the standard response. It's so frustrating