Leader: Clarity lacking on question of SNP’s legal advice

THE resignation from the SNP of MSPs Jean Urquhart and John Finnie is a severe blow to Scotland’s ruling party. The SNP leadership won a famous victory at their party conference in Perth at the weekend, updating the party’s position on Nato membership after independence.

THE resignation from the SNP of MSPs Jean Urquhart and John Finnie is a severe blow to Scotland’s ruling party. The SNP leadership won a famous victory at their party conference in Perth at the weekend, updating the party’s position on Nato membership after independence.

Now it is clear that this victory has come at a price.

The damage the pair can do to their former colleagues is limited, and on most matters it is expected they will continue to support the Scottish Government. The problem for the party leadership is that the disillusionment felt by these two MSPs is echoed among veteran anti-Nato campaigners throughout the party. Strategists may calculate that this disillusionment will fade once activists set their sights on the historic goal of independence, but in the meantime the reality is that the SNP is not the big happy family it was after last year’s Holyrood landslide. Adding to what Scottish Labour was yesterday calling a “Scomnishambles”, was the confusion caused by a statement by Nicola Sturgeon, the Deputy First Minister, on legal advice the administration may or may not have seen on an independent Scotland’s right to membership of the European Union.

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After months of stonewalling – defying a demand from Scotland’s information commissioner that it should come clean about the existence or otherwise of such advice – Ms Sturgeon yesterday said her administration had not, in fact, sought any. Only now, with the independence referendum definitely going ahead after the Edinburgh Agreement, would the Scottish Government be seeking such advice, she said.

This led to an extraordinarily blunt accusation from Labour that Alex Salmond was “a barefaced liar”, forcing the First Minister to make a statement to Holyrood to defend himself. Mr Salmond did enough to ensure the charge was “not proven”, but the SNP Government’s position on this matter begs a number of awkward questions.

If it had not sought any new advice, why did it go to court – at the cost of thousands of pounds to the taxpayer – to resist revealing this? Ms Sturgeon seemed to indicate that although the administration had not sought legal advice, some legal advice of this kind was already available to it. Mr Salmond’s interview, in a sympathetic interpretation, did the same.

There is also a question of timing. Why did Ms Sturgeon reveal this unexpectedly yesterday? Might it be that the big news story of the resignation of two SNP MSPs was seen as a convenient camouflage for this curious announcement? Was this a good day to bury bad news – or just to cause enough smoke and confusion to provide a suitable distraction?

None of this reflects well on the Scottish Government. Politicians like murky stratagems. The public prefers clarity. Above all else, clarity is what is needed in the Scottish political debate at this time.