A Labour allegation of “cash for access” over the auctioning of lunch with Ministers in the members’ restaurant has gone to the Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, whose office confirmed yesterday that a preliminary inquiry to establish whether there is a case to answer could take up to two months.
However, the Government claimed that Labour complaints had twice failed in terms of the rules. Aides say the first brought to the Commissioner’s attention issues which were clearly matters for the parliamentary authorities, while the follow-up referred to a section of the code of conduct which applied only to dealings with paid lobbyists.
An SNP spokesman said: “Labour have blundered badly. They clearly got it wrong in their initial letter and in a last-minute panic they have tried to shift their ground, but the section they now quote is about commercial lobbying, which is totally irrelevant to this issue.”
However, the prospect of entering full electioneering mode with cases still hanging over First Minister Alex Salmond and deputy Nicola Sturgeon is a nightmare scenario for the SNP, although they insisted yesterday that both would be exonerated.
A week ago Mr Salmond and Ms Sturgeon auctioned prizes of lunches hosted by them at Holyrood, attracting highest bids of £9000 and £2000 towards Osama Saeed’s campaign to wrest the Glasgow Central seat at Westminster from Labour.
It was then admitted that another three auction prizes of lunch with the First Minister had been sold for £1500 last year, and a guided tour of Holyrood by Ms Sturgeon for £260.
None of these has yet taken place and nor has money been handed over, but Labour has seized on the affair as behaviour that demeans Parliament, with a party activist raising a formal complaint with the Commissioner, Stuart Allan.
The original complaint, believed to have come from a Labour councillor, stated: “I am asking you to establish whether it is a breach of the Code of Conduct for an MSP to agree to offer to provide personal hospitality in the Parliament to person or persons unknown in return for a donation to a political party.”
An aide to Mr Salmond said this was “flawed and confused” because complaints about parliamentary facilities are deemed matters for the Parliament’s Corporate Body and excluded from the code.
But there is little hope of a swift closure as the body’s meeting tomorrow will not have a full membership present and will have to put the issue off until after next week’s recess.
Labour’s business manager Paul Martin said: “It is quite right there is a proper investigation and it is also time Alex Salmond made a full apology for bringing the office of First Minister into disrepute.”
