ALEX Salmond’s party spent more than £200,000 in its doomed Holyrood election bid, official figures have revealed.
The former First Minister’s fledgling comeback vehicle spent £214,371 on its debut campaign, the equivalent of £4.77 for each vote it won.
The money included £12,000 - almost six per cent of its campaign costs - on lawyers.
Glasgow-based solicitors Archer Coyle were paid £6000 for “legal work during election campaign” including advice on “complaints to broadcasters” and the regulator Ofcom.
During the campaign, Mr Salmond complained vociferously that Alba was not included in TV debates as it had no MSPs.
Alba also paid out £6000 - in two £3000 tranches - to Edinburgh solicitors Halliday Campbell WS for being on retainer in case of “election issues”.
Alba, which was supposed to help deliver a ‘supermajority’ for independence, only stood candidates on Holyrood’s eight regional lists.
The proportional system used means the list offered the best chance for it to get an MSP elected, with the threshold for success as low as 6 per cent.
However the party polled just 1.66% of the national vote, or 44,913 ballots, and failed to get any MSPs elected.
The Scottish Green party, which also focused on the list, spent £231,902 in the same campaign, or 91p for each of its 255,314 votes, and got eight MSPs.
The figures were released today by the Electoral Commission, as it published the spending data for the 10 parties which fought the election and spent below £250,000 campaigning.
Receipts filed by Alba show its biggest outlay was “unsolicited material to electors”, or letterbox bumpf, which soaked up more than a third of its budget, accounting for £87,706. Advertising accounted for £75,640.
Despite the high cost per vote, Alba's campaign was not the costliest based on returns.
The Communist party spent £5.62 for each of its 1,142 votes; Reform spent £9.41 for each of its 5,793 votes; the Trade Union and Socialist party spent £9.80 for each of its 1,404 votes; and the Reclaim party spent a staggering £58.61 on each of its 174 votes.
George Galloway's All for Unity spent £1.27 for each of its 23,299 votes, and UKIP spent £2.11 for each of its 3,898 votes north of the border.
Louise Edwards, Director of Regulation at the Electoral Commission said:“The publication of campaign spending information relating to this year’s Scottish Parliament election is an important part of delivering transparency, which is essential to our democratic process.
“It is vital that voters are able to see clearly and accurately how money is spent on influencing them at elections.”
An Alba spokesperson said: “In a period of only forty days between the party launching and the election we were very thankful to the thousands of people that made donations to help Alba contest our first ever election.
"Our true success is the rate we have grown our membership ranks to some 6000 strong who are ensuring that there is a political party in Scotland that exists to campaign for Scottish independence as an immediate priority.
“Alba continues to rise because there is a lack of action on independence at a time in which pressing the constitutional issue couldn’t be more important to ensure that the decisions on our future are made in Scotland, not by Westminster.
"We will continue to demand urgency of our national cause. We look forward to the Local Authority elections next year."
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