Alex Salmond Fergus Ewing Scotland reports concert community action investigations Party UPS Alex Salmond Fergus Ewing Scotland

'Plot to jail Alex Salmond' involved civil servants and government advisors, ex-SNP minister claims

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dailyrecord.co.uk

A former SNP minister has accused at least six senior civil servants and government ­advisors of plotting to have Alex Salmond jailed.In an explosive intervention, Fergus Ewing MSP claimed high-ranking ­officials conspired against the former First Minister in what he called ­Scotland’s “greatest political scandal”.

A 2020 government probe examined the handling of sexual harassment complaints made against the former SNP leader, who was later cleared of all charges against him in a separate criminal trial.Ewing told the Sunday Mail: “The concerted action taken against Alex Salmond by a group of top civil servants and special advisers – apparently with the objective of ensuring he was reported to the Crown with a view to his being charged with serious criminal offences – is the greatest political scandal of my lifetime.“Alex trounced the Scottish Government in his judicial review action, so much so that the Scottish Government’s very own lawyer and top KC deprecated the ­failings of his own client and the civil servants instructing him, in failing to reveal all the relevant documents to him.

The judge in the case found that the process adopted by the civil servants was ‘tainted with apparent bias’.“When the Scottish Government threw in the towel the judge awarded not just the normal costs but the whole expenses against them, reflecting what, on any view, was serious misconduct in the handling of the case by the civil servants.

The concerted actions revealed by documents already in the public domain demonstrate clearly that there was a determination to see that Alex Salmond was reported to the Crown Office to see him ­prosecuted and jailed.

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