Peter Murrell embezzlement trial

[Sunnnyday]

Peter Murrell is in court in Edinburgh today. This is for the preliminary hearing which was postponed from before the election. It will be interesting to see how the criminal proceedings proceed.

www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/peter-murrell-arrives-at-court-ahead-of-hearing-on-embezzlement-charges/ar-AA23Ybuy?ocid=msedgntp&pc

Ha ha. Did the home ever get used or did it just stay at his parents home unused?

NS doesn’t need to be called to give evidence now husband has pleaded guilty and I am just wondering if her husband has done some sort of deal - he is unlikely to get a huge sentence.

He is clearly some sort of Walter Mitty character but all of the timings to this whole sorry affair is very suspicious and I don’t think Laura nailed her. Put her in front of Andrew Neil.

I’m not Scottish so I hope it’s ok to comment. My concern is that snp members/MPs were asking for transparency regarding the finances around 8 years ago and were denied. The snp leadership appears to have been a fortress with no accountability. Overall I fail to understand why political parties are not treated like charities in that they must file accounts with the CC. After all, they are receiving donations. It’s about time we had clarity and transparency.

This hits the nail on the head @MeetMeOnTheCorner

Interesting that the Westminster Scottish Affairs committee are thinking of calling her to appear. They will be considerably harder on her than Laura K. Not many big names on there but my MP is.

https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/136/scottish-affairs-committee/membership/

Only one SNP MP on the committee who would probably be well advised to haud his wheesht. Interesting that it has come out that it was Salmond who advised Sturgeon that it was not a good idea to be FM while your husdband is party CEO. Sturgeon's refusal to sack Pete was apparently the start of the breakdown of their previously close relationship. I did not like Alex Salmond one bit, but he was a canny politician with oodles of experience and it just shows her arrogance that she disregarded his advice.

WARNING:

I was mid sip of a lemon San Pel when I read this and sprayed.

The problem is Westminster MPs are not really interested in Scotland politics, so the committee in Westminster won't be all over the detail, and we really need people who are completely in into the detail on this so Sturgeon (etc) can't wriggle out of it with lies, like she was able to do with Laura Kuenssberg this morning.

I think Swinney et al would prefer it if the inquiry was done by Westminster, rather than in Scotland.

The committee is made up entirely of Scottish MPs. They will know exactly what is going on and what the public feeling is up here.

She needs to be scrutinised by her countrymen who clearly have been let down badly by this disgraceful affair.

Agree. But the SNP are the largest party in the Scottish parliament and they have no appetite for any sort of enquiry which would expose all their shady dealings. Swinney - who I learned today was at school with Murrell - will resist it all the way.

iirc, Sturgeon is legally qualified? So surely she must know she will have to return things Peter bought for her!

my labour MP is on the committee, he's very good so I hope he takes no shit from sturgeon. Can she decline to attend though?

In think there are proceeds of crime proceedings ongoing so that suspect property may have been seized by the police

I think what rankled her in the BBC interview was the suggestion that their house may have to be sold to make up the shortfall. Many of the items are unaccounted for. The motor home is worth less than half of its purchase price.

Her face!

yes her mask completely slipped and the nasty side came right out.

This guardian article is quite amusing.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/31/nicola-sturgeon-interview-peter-murrell-snp-politics-sketch?shem=rimspwouoe,

archive link too

https://archive.ph/yByT9

The Guardian article is brilliant. I mean you expect The Times or The Telegraph to go to town on this but The Guardian was always so "isn't Scotland so lucky to have Nicola when we're stuck with Boris"

What happened to the rest of the money?
There were about £600K in "ring-fenced" donations for another referendum. Murrell's ~£400K don't account for all of that and he started pilfering before these specific donations. There must also have been other income (from memberships and other donations and selling merch,..) Have they just frittered it all away or is the ~£400K just what Murrell admitted to and there is more that he embezzld but it can't be traced?

I think a missive has gone out "encouraging" councillors, MSPs and party workers to donate. I know many, and almost the same message is being posted on their Facebook pages with the SNP logo. "Proud to stand up for Scotland and donate to the SNP."

This is being handled remarkably badly - the MSPs are posting similar messages on social media and using the same words - angry and betrayed. This is obviously centrally co-ordinated and just screams of insincerity.

Listened to Bernard Ponsonby's Go Radio podcast yesterday and - well- did he give Paul McLennan a roasting! Paul obviously had a script- all justifying Nicola's innocence in the embezzlement matter but Bernard stuck to the questioning on poor financial management and shutting down challenge.

Why is nobody challenging the "It wasn't public money. SNP is the victim." ? The taxpayer funded a £2m police investigation. If the proper governance had been in place then the embezzlement would have been caught earlier or not happened at all.

Yes, this pleases me too.

The Guardian article is brutal 😂

The take away for me on this is a better understanding of why our financial situation is so shit and why public services, the economy, roads etc etc are so poor - the SNP are simply not interested in the details. They want the status and the power and the ability to play at politics without any consequences or questioning, but they don't GAF about running a country effectively.

Yes. It does help to understand. And I also feel vindicated for being so sceptical about them over the years, with all the Nats screaming that you’re not a true Scot if you doubt The Party

I'll just add this. The SNP's raison d'ètre has always been the achievement of independence for Scotland. However, their view of their own party has now taken a complete about turn.

It used to be that they'd explain that - after independence - the party would split up and people would be invited to vote for Tory, Labour, Liberal etc to govern Scotland. There was no suggestion of the SNP (which was clearly made up of people with very disparate political outlooks) trying to cling onto power.

At some point, that notion seemed to disappear into the ether and there was a push for them to frame themselves as the most righteous party ever...and suddenly there was no question of their ever stepping aside.

It was Alex Salmond who started the push to the left, but he clearly didn't envisage the extreme views being taken now or the power complex being displayed.

@WearyAuldWumman they said that, and people do still trot out the 'vote SNP till indy then vote how you want'

I've always found that disingenous from the politicians and naive from supporters..to think that any party would readily abandon power (and the salaries that go with it) as soon as they acheived it....

This all day long. I simply don't think there is enough competence in the SNP to do the job of government.

Magnified tenfold in the post indy elections, any old dross was elected and this is the result. A tiny number people capable (or near to it) ended up having to corral power at the top of the SNP and govt to have any semblance of function.

The wider SNP and Holyrood simply does not have the experience or capability to scrutinise what they are doing.

I just watched the Laura Kuenssberg interview. It was good to see Nicola being questioned but I thought Laura could have done better.

When Nicola said she knew a jaguar was an expensive car but thought they could afford it I wish Laura had asked her about the details. Did she question how much it was and how he financed it? Surely you would ask things like that in a marriage for large purchases?