SNP treasurer Colin Beattie arrested by Scottish police as part of probe into party’s funding and finances
The SNP’s treasurer, Colin Beattie, has been arrested in connection with the ongoing investigation into the funding and finances of the Scottish National party, Police Scotland has announced.
A Police Scotland statement said:
A 71-year-old man has today, Tuesday, 18 April 2023, been arrested as a suspect in connection with the ongoing investigation into the funding and finances of the Scottish National party.
The man is in custody and is being questioned by Police Scotland detectives.
A report will be sent to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.
The matter is active for the purposes of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 and the public are therefore advised to exercise caution if discussing it on social media.
As the investigation is ongoing we are unable to comment further.
The SNP has been in crisis since Nicola Sturgeon stepped down as first minister, and the police intensified their investigation into mishandling of party finances. To what extent Sturgeon’s resignation was linked to the party’s financial problems remains unclear, but last week her husband, Peter Murrell, who had been the SNP’s chief executive while she was leader, was arrested by police as part of the same investigation. He was released without being charged pending further investigations.
Key events
Bill Clinton, the former US president who is in Belfast for the conference marking the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement, told BBC Ulster this morning he had become “more optimistic” about power-sharing being resumed after talks with Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the DUP leader, my colleague Lisa O’Carroll reports.
Bill Clinton says he’s “more optimistic” that Stormont will return after a meeting with Jeffrey Donaldson.
Tells BBC Ulster that “Brexit threw a clinker” into the situation
“I think that finding a political solution to that is taking some doing and I think they’re pretty close”— Lisa O’Carroll (@lisaocarroll) April 18, 2023
Clinton: Said he cdn’t talk about what Donaldson said but he thought “the barriers” to power-sharing “will be removed because I think everybody knows economically, socially, politically, they’d be worse off if they packed it in over the current level of disagreement” over Brexit.
— Lisa O’Carroll (@lisaocarroll) April 18, 2023
In the Commons there is one urgent question today, on the US leak of top secret documents, and one statement, from the policing minister Chris Philp, on a new crackdown on dangerous knives.
Hundreds of civil servants working in jobcentres are to stage a fresh strike in a long-running dispute over jobs, pay, pensions and conditions, PA Media reports. PA says:
The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) said more than 600 of its members at 13 jobcentres in Glasgow and Liverpool will strike for five days from 2 May.
The union said Glasgow hads been targeted for disruptive action because it is one of the areas piloting a scheme on claimants having to attend an office several times over two weeks, while Liverpool will face action because of plans to close a local jobcentre.
PCS members are this week on strike in the Passport Office, Ofgem, and Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency ahead of a nationwide walkout by 133,000 civil servants on 28 April.
Here is my colleague Severin Carrell’s story about the SNP arrest.
And this is what he says about the police investigation that led to the arrest of the party’s treasurer.
The police investigation was launched in 2021 after complaints were made about the SNP’s handling of over £600,000 in donations given to the party, ostensibly for a fresh independence referendum campaign launched in 2019.
It emerged that money was not put into a separate, segregated SNP account but Sturgeon said it was all accounted for, and the equivalent figure would be spent by the party on that referendum campaign.
Speaking in 2021, Sturgeon said: “Money hasn’t gone missing; all money goes through the SNP accounts independently all fully audited.
“We don’t hold separate accounts – we’re under no legal requirement to do that. Our accounts are managed on a cashflow basis, but every penny we raise to support the campaign for independence will be spent on the campaign for independence.”
So far, no campaign has been launched. Last week it emerged that Johnston Carmichael, the accountancy firm, quit as the SNP’s external auditors.
Power-sharing ‘surest way’ to maintain union, Northern Ireland secretary Chris Heaton-Harris tells DUP
Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, has used a speech in Belfast to urge the DUP to resume power-sharing. Here are some of the key lines from what he said at the Queen’s University conference to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement.
The simple reality is that people tend to change the status quo only when the status quo is not working, or people simply stop making the case for it.
Devolved power-sharing institutions created a status quo that those of us who value Northern Ireland’s place in the union can robustly and successfully promote and celebrate.
So let no one tell you that power-sharing is at any way at odds with unionism.
Instead it is the surest way by which Northern Ireland’s place in the union can be secured.
This line was applauded by the audience.
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He said the “biggest threat” to the union was failure to deliver on what people wanted. Government in Northern Ireland has not been functioning properly since the DUP pulled out of the executive early last year, meaning power-sharing cannot operate. Government agencies are still functioning, but important decisions are being postponed, and decisions are being taken by officials, or by London, not by Northern Ireland’s politicians. Heaton-Harris said:
The people of Northern Ireland are rightly demanding better, more responsive public services, greater economic prosperity and a brighter future for their children.
The biggest threat to Northern Ireland’s place in the union is failing to deliver on these priorities.
That it was somehow all-out wins for nationalism. That narrative is wrong. And all of those, all of us who support the agreement, must be vocal in countering it.
Today, the principle of consent is so often taken for granted but it was an important and hard-won guarantee that settled Northern Ireland to remain as part of the United Kingdom.
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He said leadership was about saying yes. Unionism has been associated with saying no at least since the 1980s, but Heaton-Harris said:
Like David Trimble, David Ervine before in 1998, Dr Paisley in 2006, real leadership is about knowing when to say yes and having the courage to do so.
I’m afraid we have had to turn off comments because of the risk of people posting prejudicial matter in relation to the story about the arrest of the SNP’s treasurer. It is possible they may reopen later in the day.
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Labour says Scotland deserves better than ‘divided and distracted SNP’
The arrest of the SNP’s treasurer (see 9.30am) is obviously a gift for Scottish Labour. The party has this morning posted this on Twitter, highlighting a speech Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, gave yesterday.
Last night the Scottish government released an extract from the statement Humza Yousaf will deliver to MSPs today about his priorities for government. He will say:
In just under three weeks, this government has tripled our support for households struggling with high energy bills with our £30m fuel insecurity fund, announced an additional £25m to help the north-east become the net zero capital of the world, and reinforced our commitment to supporting families with a £15m investment in free high-quality school age childcare.
These measures will make a real difference, and have come as a response to the challenges presented by our ongoing recovery from the Covid pandemic and a cost of living crisis exacerbated by Brexit and the UK government’s economic mismanagement, as well as climate change impacts and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine …
My cabinet has considered how we can build a better future for Scotland and the outcomes necessary to achieve that – through a determined focus on reducing poverty and strengthening public services, seizing the opportunity to build a growing and green wellbeing economy through the net zero transition and supporting business, and reaffirming our commitment to equality, inclusion, and human rights in everything we do.
We will do so using the powers of devolution to their maximum, whilst making the case that as an independent nation, we can do so much more to make Scotland a wealthier, fairer, and greener country.
Yousaf is also due to publish a policy prospectus for his government.
Today was meant to be the day Humza Yousaf, the new SNP leader and Scottish first minister, performed a government relaunch. He is due to address the Scottish parliament this afternoon to set out his priorities for Scotland. But instead the news is dominated by another SNP arrest.
This is from the Scottish commentator Iain Macwhirter.
Another arrest. Party treasurer Colin Beattie taken into custody in campervangate. On the very day of Humza’s big speech to parliament. He must feel fate has it in for him. Me on what he’ll say. Or not say. https://t.co/p1vrqRegWV
— Iain Macwhirter (@iainmacwhirter) April 18, 2023
And this is from the Herald’s Tom Gordon.
SNP treasurer Colin Beattie arrested by Scottish police as part of probe into party’s funding and finances
The SNP’s treasurer, Colin Beattie, has been arrested in connection with the ongoing investigation into the funding and finances of the Scottish National party, Police Scotland has announced.
A Police Scotland statement said:
A 71-year-old man has today, Tuesday, 18 April 2023, been arrested as a suspect in connection with the ongoing investigation into the funding and finances of the Scottish National party.
The man is in custody and is being questioned by Police Scotland detectives.
A report will be sent to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.
The matter is active for the purposes of the Contempt of Court Act 1981 and the public are therefore advised to exercise caution if discussing it on social media.
As the investigation is ongoing we are unable to comment further.
The SNP has been in crisis since Nicola Sturgeon stepped down as first minister, and the police intensified their investigation into mishandling of party finances. To what extent Sturgeon’s resignation was linked to the party’s financial problems remains unclear, but last week her husband, Peter Murrell, who had been the SNP’s chief executive while she was leader, was arrested by police as part of the same investigation. He was released without being charged pending further investigations.
Rishi Sunak’s integrity not in doubt, despite inquiry by parliament watchdog, says minister
Good morning. Rishi Sunak will be chairing cabinet this morning, in the awkward position of having joined the list of MPs being investigated by the parliamentary commissioner for standards. Chris Philp, the policing minister, has been giving interviews this morning and he told GB News that Sunak’s integrity was not in doubt.
Referring to Sunak’s appearance at the liaison committee last month, and an evasive answer that triggered the complaint to the standards commissioner, Philp said:
I think no one really doubts Rishi’s integrity and ethics. He has declared his wife’s interests in his ministerial declaration. He did draw attention to that to the committee when he gave evidence and he also wrote to them subsequently as well.
He will work with the standards commissioner to clear up any questions that are outstanding.
But I don’t think there’s anything sinister here, he has made his declaration.
Philp’s account rather glosses over the fact that, when Sunak, as he puts it, drew the committee’s attention to the fact that he had relevant interests to declare, what Sunak actually said was that he did not have anything to declare. And such declarations as he had made had been made in private, for publication in a document (the updated list of ministers’ interests) that is still not out. That is hardly a good example of the “accountability” he promised when he took office.
In her London Playbook briefing for Politico, Rosa Prince says No 10 is confident Sunak will be cleared and quotes this defence from an insider.
A government official suggested that Sunak had not been asked a specific question about Koru Kids, and could not be expected to be across every firm his wife invested in, given her wide range of financial interests. He told the committee he had made all the correct declarations because he had lodged his wife’s financial affairs with the Cabinet Office. And the fact that the register of interests has not been published in over a year is a result of the high turnover of ministers in recent months, and the fact there was no independent adviser until recently.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.15am: Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, gives a speech at the Queen’s University Belfast conference on the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement.
Morning: Rishi Sunak chairs cabinet.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
Morning: Keir Starmer is campaigning in York.
12.15pm: Angela Rayner, the deputy Labour leader, gives a speech to the Scottish TUC conference in Dundee.
2.20pm: Humza Yousaf, Scotland’s new first minister, gives a statement to MSPs setting out his priorities for government.
Also, James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, is at the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting in Japan, and Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, is in Washington.
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