Alex Salmond, former SNP leader and First Minister of Scotland,  has resigned from the SNP.

The reason he has given is to save the SNP the embarrassment and consequences of suspending him from the party while he defends himself against allegations of sexual misconduct.

BBC Newsnight said tonight that Salmond had always disagreed with suspending persons under allegation of misconduct, and that a presumption of innocence should prevail.  This is an additional feature of his complaint against the disciplinary procedure to which he is subject, and which he is now challenging by Judicial Review.  Jeremy Corbyn faces the same issue in the Labour Party and has resisted suspending people until due process has been followed.  Suspension can itself influence proceedings as momentum builds against an accused person.

This draws attention to a more general error, when party leaders have expelled politicians on air for making politically incorrect remarks.  David Cameron did this with Conservative candidate Philip Lardner in 2010, boasting that he had acted ‘within minutes’, and Nigel Farage did so with a UKIP councillor.  It is part of the well-known behaviour of any institution which sacrifices the individual in order to protect the institution.  I call this ‘the Caiaphas principle’, after the high priest Caiaphas who said about the murder of Jesus Christ: ‘it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people and not that the whole nation should perish’ Jn 11:50.  It is very common institutional behaviour, as whistleblowers discover to their cost.

BBC Newsnight said that Salmond claims that natural justice has been denied him by the disciplinary method to which he has been subject.

In addition he is using a crowdfunder campaign to pay for the Judicial Review.  I have previously drawn attention to 1. the financial injustice of unequal access to the law in Scotland and to 2. the effect of prosecuting celebrities and those in public life upon improving legislation.  However, the inequality still exists because the average person is unlikely to secure enough financial support by crowdfunding and, besides, should not have to.

Links:

29 Aug 2018: Alex Salmond’s full resignation statement.

8 Jan 2019: Good news for Alex Salmond.  Lord Pentland at the Court of Session found the investigation was unlawful, “procedurally unfair and tainted by apparent bias”.  However, it is questionable if a lesser individual would have had the capacity to challenge the Scottish Government before the Court of Session.  Salmond admits that without crowdfunding he would have been unable to defend himself.  He writes in an open letter:

“Many thousands of people have written to me over the last few months, which has been a great source of encouragement. Some have had heart rending stories of battles against injustice and brutal officialdom. After my recent experience, I will be doing my very best to help.”  Alex Salmond

For those who are not on Facebook, here is Salmond’s press statement.

10 Jan 2019: Pressure on Nicola Sturgeon about her role in the investigation.

10 Jan 2019: Alex Salmond is turning the tables on the Scottish Government to investigate leaks about his case.

13 Aug 2019: Alex Salmond wins £512,250 in damages for the Scottish Government’s incompetence in investigating the legal case against him. He still faces charges which he denies.

23 Mar 2020: Alex Salmond has been cleared of 13 charges of sexual assault against nine women.

8 Jan 2021: a blow-by-blow account explaining Alex Salmond’s case against Nicola Sturgeon. The Times editor in Scotland summarises it in a tweet.

16 Jan 2021: the misuse of police power in Scotland.

1 Feb 2021: George Galloway on the framing of Alex Salmond.

3 Feb 2021: SNP personnel under the spotlight.

6 Feb 2021: Alex Salmond refused to attend the harassment complaints inquiry at the Scottish Parliament as it will muzzle his testimony. He claims he will not be able to tell “the whole truth” as expected by his oath. Exposure is too much for some people, however, “the truth will out.”

9 Feb 2021: Salmond confirms he will not attend the inquiry as it will not publish his complete testimony. Today, Scotland’s top law officer apologizes for “malicious” prosecution of former Rangers’ administrators. All is not well with Scotland’s SNP administration.

11 Feb 2021: would a foreign observer consider the Scottish Parliament inquiry to be democratic?

23 Feb 2021: Fraser Nelson explains the issues around the Scottish committee Inquiry. The Crown Office ordered the committee to redact Alex Salmond’s evidence and the debate is about “the separation of powers” and “the healthy functioning of Scottish democracy”.

26 Feb 2021: the Alex Salmond Show, not on Russia Today, but Salmond’s appearance before MSPs committee investigating the Scottish administraton’s mishandling of complaints against him.

17 Mar 2021: David Davis, MP, used parliamentary privilege to release new information about the Alex Salmond case. Meanwhile, the findings of an inquiry into the SNP Scottish administration’s handling of the case have been published today. Further details are here.

18 Mar 2021: the First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has been judged to have misled the Holyrood Committee of Inquiry. A report on Sky news adds that, “as such, she misled parliament and potentially breached the ministerial code of conduct.” These three points are made as a result of a leak from the Committee proceedings and the official Report is scheduled to be published next Tuesday 23 Mar 2021. The vote 5:4 is probably along political party lines as there were four SNP MSPs on the Committee and five other MSPs. Sturgeon has accused the vote of being partisan and that the leak was also so: “this leak from the Committee, very partisan leak tonight, before they’ve actually finalised the report, is not that surprising.”