SNP must face Westminster investigation into embezzled funds scandal, says former Scottish Tory leader
It comes after it was revealed that most of the cash is unlikely to be recovered unless the party sues Peter Murrell and Nicola Sturgeon for the assets directly
The SNP must face a Westminster investigation as UK taxpayer’s money may have been swindled, the ex-Tory Scottish leader has told LBC.
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Baroness Ruth Davidson said that it was “unlikely” that all of the £400,000 that the former SNP chief executive, Peter Murrell, embezzled from the party would be returned, but she urged prosecutors and the party to attempt to claw some of it back.
It comes after it was revealed that most of the cash is unlikely to be recovered unless the party sues Peter Murrell and Nicola Sturgeon for the assets directly.
The SNP leader and First Minister, John Swinney, has played down calls for an inquiry into how the former top politician was able to steal vast sums of money from the party over many years.
Mr Murrell pled guilty to embezzling a staggering £400,000 from the SNP last week - with spending on luxurious items from motorhomes to hoovers, and expensive salt and pepper shakers.
Read more: In pictures: Inside the motorhome Peter Murrell bought as he embezzled £400,000 from the SNP
Read more: SNP could owe the taxman thousands after embezzler Murrell's dodgy accounting
Former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has insisted she knew nothing of his crimes, but critics have called for a full investigation into the scandal.
Baroness Ruth Davidson told LBC she should face further questions.
She said: "The charge is that as the leader of an organisation, she didn't look at all the red flags that came when her treasurer resigned, when three members of our Audit Committee resigned, when the external auditors resigned, all saying they were not getting the information they needed, they couldn't look at the books.
"So it's not that we're saying that she was part of the embezzlement, but that her leadership and her period and the way that she shut down any questions about how the finances of the SNP… and created a climate wherein that embezzlement could happen.”
She admitted that police were unlikely to recover all of the money, but that “it is worth” trying, adding: “You shouldn't get to keep ill gotten gains, you don't deserve to have them. They were defrauded.
"It was a crime. So yes, as much as can be recovered I hope is recovered.”
Some of the party funds were used to buy Ms Sturgeon gifts, including a pendant necklace she regularly wore in public.
The former Scottish Tory leader, who is now in the House of Lords, says there is a "more than 50 per cent likelihood that taxpayers money was wrapped up in this, that there would be short money that came through.”
She backed calls for a Westminster-led investigation to get to the bottom of how "Nintendo systems, toilet rolls, salt and pepper sets, hair dryers, nine hoovers” were all bought on party cash - and whether any of that was from taxpayers.
The ex-SNP Health Secretary, Alex Neil, joined those calls over the weekend, saying the party may never recover if it doesn’t.
The Scottish Affairs Committee in Westminster is set to have a debate on Monday to decide whether to undertake an inquiry.
The SNP has insisted the issue is an internal party matter.
But each opposition political party is entitled to so-called ’short money’ of funds from taxpayers, to pay for things like office costs, expenses, travel and other costs.
Baroness Davidson said she was “genuinely astonished” at Mr Swinney’s response to the calls, adding: "There has to be an inquiry, because this wasn't just internal SNP money.
"The SNP received millions of pounds of taxpayer money too, through the short money system, through other systems that may have been part of this embezzlement. So actually, the taxpayer deserves to have answers here too.”
She was speaking to LBC as she launches a new campaign today on student fees, calling on the Chancellor to rip up the student finance system and make it fit for purpose.
Alongside former Conservative Mayor, Andy Street, the Prosper UK group today say that graduate loans in their current form are a “tax on aspiration” and that
LBC has been told how millions of students are stuck paying off just the interest on their loans, while their debt continues to rise.
Students on some plans face changing terms of their loan, and face paying sky-high levels of money back thanks to inflation rising.
Earlier this year the Chancellor argued the system was fair, but Cabinet ministers have now admitted the system is ripe for reform.
The government’s said that they are looking at ways to change the system, and have already frozen some student loans’ interest rates in reaction to the war in Ukraine.
The Fair Fees campaign wants the loans to be “realistically repaid” rather than being “a tax in all but name” and mean that middle earners are not “left worse off the harder they try”.
Rules should not be rewritten after loans are taken out, they also argue.
Baroness Davidson said: “A whole generation of young people who did all the right things - studying hard, gaining their degree and and entering the workforce - are being punished with charges far more than the amounts they borrowed.
"The loans they were sold are now operating as a tax on aspiration. Many will be shackled with eye-watering debts for decades under a system so discredited the government refuses to use it to uprate other payments. It is a national scandal."