THE Holyrood inquiry into the Alex Salmond affair has said it is now “actively exploring” ways to bypass the Scottish Government after it refused to supply key evidence.
The cross-party group of MSPs said they were looking at whether they could obtain records “directly” from the Scottish Courts after ministers cited legal privilege to withhold them.
The move was driven by the “lack of documentation provided by the Scottish Government”.
The inquiry made the disclosure in new letters to the Government’s top law officer, the Lord Advocate James Wolffe QC, and its top official, Permanent Secretary Leslie Evans.
It also said it wanted to recall Ms Evans, who gave evidence last week, for a second evidence session on September 8.
Mr Wolffe has been asked to appear for the first time the same day.
The inquiry is investigating how the Government botched an in-house probe into sexual misconduct claims against Mr Salmond in 2018.
The former First Minister overturned it in a judicial review by showing it had been unfair, unlawful and “tainted by apparent bias”, leaving taxpayers with a £500,000 bill for his costs.
Immediately after the collapse of the Government’s case in January 2019, Nicola Sturgeon told MSPs any future inquiry “will be able to request whatever material they want, and I undertake today that we will provide whatever material they request”.
However her Government has since refused to hand over swathes of evidence related to the judicial review by asserting “legal privilege” and tried to stop witnesses from testifying.
In the letters to Ms Evans and Mr Wolffe, the inquiry’s SNP convener Linda Fabiani said MSPs remained “unclear on the dates and details of key Government decisions that influenced the direction of the [judicial] review”.
They therefore wanted to hold an “exploratory session” with Ms Evans, Mr Wolffe and other relevant officials to see if they would deliver a “detailed account of the review process” in oral evidence, as promised to the inquiry by Deputy First Minister John Swinney.
“Having established what the Government is willing and able to share in initial oral evidence, the Committee can then consider further steps to obtain the evidence it requires to scrutinise the judicial review process in more detail later in its inquiry,” she said.
Ms Fabiani said the inquiry wanted to explore the extent to which legal privilege had been applied to the documents, the timing of Government decisions during the review, “the Government’s approach to sharing information” during the review, and the associated cost.
She reminded Mr Wolffe and Ms Evans that the committee wanted a breakdown of the documents the Government claims it cannot supply as they belong to the court.
She said: “As you are aware the Committee has also sought documents from Alex Salmond, and where these documents cannot be shared, for example due to an associated court order, the Committee has sought details of the type of documents that come into this category.
“This includes documents provided to the judicial review by the Government.
“Given the lack of documentation provided by the Scottish Government, the Committee is also now actively exploring whether specific documents not bound by the associated court order, can be accessed directly from the courts if required.”
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