The Scottish Politics Thread

[Blackmac]

Also worth reminding you all that once an arrest is made in Scotland, contempt of court protections are triggered. So wild speculation and assertions have the potential to land you in a deal of trouble.

That's not correct. Arrest is merely a police procedure. There can't be contempt until charges are brought before a court either by copy complaint or indictment. Everyone can speculate away to their hearts content.

It is right: see s.2(4) and sch. 1 Contempt of Court Act 1981 - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1981/49

The most relevant bit is in sch 1:

Subject to the following provisions of this Schedule, criminal proceedings are active from the relevant initial step specified in paragraph 4 or 4A until concluded as described in paragraph 5.
…
4. The initial steps of criminal proceedings are:—

(a) arrest without warrant;
…

That is just talking about the process involved. There are different types of arrest. At the moment we are at the investigative stage as he has only been arrested for questioning. The courts aren't even involved yet and essentially have no knowledge of the crimes under investigation as they have not been informed of the proposed charges.
The only involvement of a court will have been a sheriff in Edinburgh and Glasgow will have been approached to grant a warrant to search each of the respective premises.

[Blackmac]

That's not correct. Arrest is merely a police procedure. There can't be contempt until charges are brought before a court either by copy complaint or indictment. Everyone can speculate away to their hearts content.

It is right: see s.2(4) and sch. 1 Contempt of Court Act 1981 - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1981/49

The most relevant bit is in sch 1:

Subject to the following provisions of this Schedule, criminal proceedings are active from the relevant initial step specified in paragraph 4 or 4A until concluded as described in paragraph 5.
…
4. The initial steps of criminal proceedings are:—

(a) arrest without warrant;
…

Thankee kindly sir

That doesn't contradict anything I have said. As I said, no court is formally aware of any charges yet so is not in any position to judge whether contempt has been committed. At this stage the only charges that would be considered would be attempts to pervert or prevent the course of justice.

[Blackmac]

It is right: see s.2(4) and sch. 1 Contempt of Court Act 1981 - https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1981/49

The most relevant bit is in sch 1:

Subject to the following provisions of this Schedule, criminal proceedings are active from the relevant initial step specified in paragraph 4 or 4A until concluded as described in paragraph 5.
…
4. The initial steps of criminal proceedings are:—

(a) arrest without warrant;
…

Thankee kindly sir

That doesn't contradict anything I have said. As I said, no court is formally aware of any charges yet so is not in any position to judge whether contempt has been committed. At this stage the only charges that would be considered would be attempts to pervert or prevent the course of justice.

As I said there are different types of arrest. At the moment Murrell has only been under investigative arrest and the Scottish processes highlighted under section 24 relate to the stage where the investigation moves on to charging a suspect and the court is made aware of the charges through indictment, complaint or the suspect appearing from custody under judicial arrest.

[Blackmac]

To try and put it in layman's terms. In Scotland, and most other judiciaries, the court and the investigative authorities, in Scotland that is COPFS and the police, are entirely separate entities, so that one cannot be seen to influence the other. It's only once an investigation has been completed and COPFS and the police have decided on the charges to be brought that the courts are made aware of those charges. So essentially as the court has no involvement prior to this stage it would be impossible for the court to know if anyone is in contempt.
One of the worst cases of media speculation, and very damaging speculation I ever experience during an investigation was Jodie Jone's murder where it became clear that the reporting may taint any chance of a fair trial. Certain media outfits were approached and warned in no uncertain terms about their behaviour and warned that if they continued they faced being arrested for attempting to pervert the course of justice. Once Mitchell was charged the responsibility to ensure a fair trial falls to the courts and they would have proceeded under contempt of court.

[Blackmac]

There are a number of ways in which judicial proceedings are instigated.

Copy complaint- Most common and used for less serious offences. An investigation is carried out and police decide if there is a sufficiency of evidence. The suspect is charged and may or may not have been arrested depending on the circumstances. Police then report to COPFS who decide if the charges are competent and it is in the interest of justice to proceed. If yes, they send a Copy Complaint to the accused, outlining the charges and giving them a date to appear in court at a Sheriff Summary hearing. Once the suspect appears in court, court proceedings are instigated and contempt rules apply.

Indictment - used for more serious offences. And again a suspect may or may not have been arrested, but the likelihood is that the will have either been under investigative and or formal arrest at some time during this investigation. Same process, but this time the suspect is issued with an Indictment and summoned to appear at a higher court, the Sheriff Solemn. Again, once they have appeared, court proceedings are instigated and contempt law applies. The Sheriff Solemn will decide if the case is held there or referred up to the High Court. If it is referred up, the accused will receive a further Indictment indicating so.

Arrest without warrant. This is where people are getting caught up as it is completely different to what has happened to Murrell, which is Investigative arrest.
This usually happens in more spontaneous or serious cases where the police decide that there is a necessity to keep the suspect in custody, usually due to the nature or seriousness of the offence. Police may or may not have arrested the suspect for questioning. If they did need to question him, they would have arrested him for questioning and then moved to formal arrest once sufficiency of evidence was reached. If there was already sufficiency of evidence without questioning, they would have moved straight to formal arrest.
Once formally arrested the accused is held in custody to appear at court the next lawful day where the court is made aware of the charges. The court will either decide to remand the accused or release them pending their court date, usually under bail conditions. This is where contempt laws would apply.

Arrest with warrant. This is when an investigation has been completed and the suspect, for whatever reason has not or cannot be traced. The police report the circumstances to COPFS who apply to the court for an arrest warrant. Once issued the warrant grants police greater powers to trace and arrest an accused. Once arrested the accused will be held in police custody and again brought before a court on the next lawful day where it will be decided how to proceed. Again this is where contempt laws would apply.

Investigative arrest only started in Scotland about 8 years ago, prior to that the investigative process was facilitated by detention under Section 14 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. Section 14 procedure was very limited by a number of aspects, crucially that the suspect could only be detained once and for a maximum of 6 hours, which was horrendously limiting. Rather than tweak the existing legislation they scrubbed it and moved to a similar process to E&W where the suspect can either be arrested for questioning or formally arrested. It provides greater time limits for the police and also allows multiple arrests for questioning which as I said is completely different to what the courts recognise as "arrest without warrant".

Apologies for the long reply but I am day off, bored, and as I have spent my whole working life involved in the process, often at a very grave level, so I'm a bit vexed that my knowledge is being questioned.

[Slick]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

[Biffer]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

Clam down, I'm sure there could never be a political motivation from a Crown police force full of masons.

[inactionman]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

I'm intrigued as to what could possibly be (physically) buried.

[Blackmac]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

Yeah it does seem an extraordinary length of time to conduct a search for evidence of fraud in such a premises. Stuff shouldn't be getting anything other than a cursory examination to establish its relevance and if it should be seized and examined away from the locus. They must be fairly certain there is still stuff to be found.

In the police's defence, the whole yank perp walk routine is not really in our nature so they tend to like to get in and out of these situations with a minimum of fuss. In addition such a high profile enquiry will have high level COPFS officials all over it and the head of the Crown Office is an SG appointee.

[Blackmac]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

Clam down, I'm sure there could never be a political motivation from a Crown police force full of masons.

Ah that old chestnut. Hard to get your head round that suggestion when the most high profile screw up by COPFS was the malicious prosecution of those involved in the Rangers saga. A prosecution driven entirely by senior officials in COPFS and not Police Scotland. I'm not saying it doesn't exist to a certain extent but in my whole career I never saw anything even remotely close to Masonic influence in the police and certainly not a live investigation, but what do I know, maybe just lucky.

[Biffer]

Have to say, seeing the police marching in again this morning it seems way over the top

Clam down, I'm sure there could never be a political motivation from a Crown police force full of masons.

Ah that old chestnut. Hard to get your head round that suggestion when the most high profile screw up by COPFS was the malicious prosecution of those involved in the Rangers saga. A prosecution driven entirely by senior officials in COPFS and not Police Scotland. I'm not saying it doesn't exist to a certain extent but in my whole career I never saw anything even remotely close to Masonic influence in the police and certainly not a live investigation, but what do I know, maybe just lucky.

Yeah, that was tongue firmly in cheek. But as a rebuttal to the other point of view that is insisting there's some kind of cover up and Sturgeon was in charge of the timing. Easy to talk bullshit in either direction, both equally credible.

[Blackmac]

Clam down, I'm sure there could never be a political motivation from a Crown police force full of masons.

Ah that old chestnut. Hard to get your head round that suggestion when the most high profile screw up by COPFS was the malicious prosecution of those involved in the Rangers saga. A prosecution driven entirely by senior officials in COPFS and not Police Scotland. I'm not saying it doesn't exist to a certain extent but in my whole career I never saw anything even remotely close to Masonic influence in the police and certainly not a live investigation, but what do I know, maybe just lucky.

Yeah, that was tongue firmly in cheek. But as a rebuttal to the other point of view that is insisting there's some kind of cover up and Sturgeon was in charge of the timing. Easy to talk bullshit in either direction, both equally credible.

No I totally agree with you in that respect. I have it first hand that Murrell had a lot of influence in the Salmond enquiry, however I don't think there is a cat in hells chance that there is any influence in how this is progressing. I think Murrell and Sturgeon saw the writing on the wall but it was pretty obvious to most people.

[Ymx]

A reminder that it was nearly a year ago that Michelle Mone's house was raided by the cops and there's been nothing,no charges brought and she was given two weeks to flee the country rather than talk to the police. That was for £133million of everyone's money.

Someone has been on Twitter today.

I used to get annoyed at this kind of deflection nonsense but it’s just laughable now as the walls cave in

Hey, not deflection, as you well know I'm not the biggest of SNP fans. Just pointing out that an SNP administration which has control / authority over / however you want to put it of Police Scotland is being investigated by Police Scotland actively and vigorously, but the Police Force which reports to the tory controlled home office isn't investigating the Tory alleged fraud and corruption with any kind of similar vigour. Still think it's the same?

Is it serious? Is there birthday cake buried in the yard?

[Yr Alban]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

[Blackmac]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

[Biffer]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

[fishfoodie]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

it's that old conflict; he's a criminal genius, but he's also stupid enough to bury the evidence in his own back garden

[inactionman]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

Haven't a clue, but they seem to be looking for something in some very odd places, which suggests they know/suspect something we don't. They might find something, they might not, but I can't believe they're searching on the off chance.

Unless they jus thought nicola hadn't been keeping up with the weeding and needed a hand. The police don't generally do that.

[Blackmac]

They literally didn’t have this scale of forensics when they were investigating Fred West. This is an investigation into financial irregularities. Do they think Murrell has buried his accountant in the garden?

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

Very true. Often the evidence just isn't there. Take it on the chin and move on. On a couple of occasions I was accused of fabricating or planting evidence during a major investigation. Myself and most cops I knew just didn't take it personally enough to go anywhere near that shit or risk our livelihoods. More fool any cop that does.

[Blackmac]

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

Haven't a clue, but they seem to be looking for something in some very odd places, which suggests they know/suspect something we don't. They might find something, they might not, but I can't believe they're searching on the off chance.

Unless they jus thought nicola hadn't been keeping up with the weeding and needed a hand. The police don't generally do that.

Hold on now. I finished decorating a living room during a drugs search. The suspect, who was a regular, and pretty well liked, old school criminal was in the middle of it when we kicked in the door. I felt finishing the wall was a better option than rummaging through the house.

[Plim]

There are a number of ways in which judicial proceedings are instigated.

Copy complaint- Most common and used for less serious offences. An investigation is carried out and police decide if there is a sufficiency of evidence. The suspect is charged and may or may not have been arrested depending on the circumstances. Police then report to COPFS who decide if the charges are competent and it is in the interest of justice to proceed. If yes, they send a Copy Complaint to the accused, outlining the charges and giving them a date to appear in court at a Sheriff Summary hearing. Once the suspect appears in court, court proceedings are instigated and contempt rules apply.

Indictment - used for more serious offences. And again a suspect may or may not have been arrested, but the likelihood is that the will have either been under investigative and or formal arrest at some time during this investigation. Same process, but this time the suspect is issued with an Indictment and summoned to appear at a higher court, the Sheriff Solemn. Again, once they have appeared, court proceedings are instigated and contempt law applies. The Sheriff Solemn will decide if the case is held there or referred up to the High Court. If it is referred up, the accused will receive a further Indictment indicating so.

Arrest without warrant. This is where people are getting caught up as it is completely different to what has happened to Murrell, which is Investigative arrest.
This usually happens in more spontaneous or serious cases where the police decide that there is a necessity to keep the suspect in custody, usually due to the nature or seriousness of the offence. Police may or may not have arrested the suspect for questioning. If they did need to question him, they would have arrested him for questioning and then moved to formal arrest once sufficiency of evidence was reached. If there was already sufficiency of evidence without questioning, they would have moved straight to formal arrest.
Once formally arrested the accused is held in custody to appear at court the next lawful day where the court is made aware of the charges. The court will either decide to remand the accused or release them pending their court date, usually under bail conditions. This is where contempt laws would apply.

Arrest with warrant. This is when an investigation has been completed and the suspect, for whatever reason has not or cannot be traced. The police report the circumstances to COPFS who apply to the court for an arrest warrant. Once issued the warrant grants police greater powers to trace and arrest an accused. Once arrested the accused will be held in police custody and again brought before a court on the next lawful day where it will be decided how to proceed. Again this is where contempt laws would apply.

Investigative arrest only started in Scotland about 8 years ago, prior to that the investigative process was facilitated by detention under Section 14 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. Section 14 procedure was very limited by a number of aspects, crucially that the suspect could only be detained once and for a maximum of 6 hours, which was horrendously limiting. Rather than tweak the existing legislation they scrubbed it and moved to a similar process to E&W where the suspect can either be arrested for questioning or formally arrested. It provides greater time limits for the police and also allows multiple arrests for questioning which as I said is completely different to what the courts recognise as "arrest without warrant".

Apologies for the long reply but I am day off, bored, and as I have spent my whole working life involved in the process, often at a very grave level, so I'm a bit vexed that my knowledge is being questioned.

Just giving my view. I’m a barrister, but in England. My understanding was that the position is the same in both E&W and S.

Police Scotland seem to agree with my understanding: see https://www.scotland.police.uk/what-s-h ... -arrested/

That page includes this:

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.

[inactionman]

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

Haven't a clue, but they seem to be looking for something in some very odd places, which suggests they know/suspect something we don't. They might find something, they might not, but I can't believe they're searching on the off chance.

Unless they jus thought nicola hadn't been keeping up with the weeding and needed a hand. The police don't generally do that.

Hold on now. I finished decorating a living room during a drugs search. The suspect, who was a regular, and pretty well liked, old school criminal was in the middle of it when we kicked in the door. I felt finishing the wall was a better option than rummaging through the house.

It must have been some pretty strong gear

[Blackmac]

There are a number of ways in which judicial proceedings are instigated.

Copy complaint- Most common and used for less serious offences. An investigation is carried out and police decide if there is a sufficiency of evidence. The suspect is charged and may or may not have been arrested depending on the circumstances. Police then report to COPFS who decide if the charges are competent and it is in the interest of justice to proceed. If yes, they send a Copy Complaint to the accused, outlining the charges and giving them a date to appear in court at a Sheriff Summary hearing. Once the suspect appears in court, court proceedings are instigated and contempt rules apply.

Indictment - used for more serious offences. And again a suspect may or may not have been arrested, but the likelihood is that the will have either been under investigative and or formal arrest at some time during this investigation. Same process, but this time the suspect is issued with an Indictment and summoned to appear at a higher court, the Sheriff Solemn. Again, once they have appeared, court proceedings are instigated and contempt law applies. The Sheriff Solemn will decide if the case is held there or referred up to the High Court. If it is referred up, the accused will receive a further Indictment indicating so.

Arrest without warrant. This is where people are getting caught up as it is completely different to what has happened to Murrell, which is Investigative arrest.
This usually happens in more spontaneous or serious cases where the police decide that there is a necessity to keep the suspect in custody, usually due to the nature or seriousness of the offence. Police may or may not have arrested the suspect for questioning. If they did need to question him, they would have arrested him for questioning and then moved to formal arrest once sufficiency of evidence was reached. If there was already sufficiency of evidence without questioning, they would have moved straight to formal arrest.
Once formally arrested the accused is held in custody to appear at court the next lawful day where the court is made aware of the charges. The court will either decide to remand the accused or release them pending their court date, usually under bail conditions. This is where contempt laws would apply.

Arrest with warrant. This is when an investigation has been completed and the suspect, for whatever reason has not or cannot be traced. The police report the circumstances to COPFS who apply to the court for an arrest warrant. Once issued the warrant grants police greater powers to trace and arrest an accused. Once arrested the accused will be held in police custody and again brought before a court on the next lawful day where it will be decided how to proceed. Again this is where contempt laws would apply.

Investigative arrest only started in Scotland about 8 years ago, prior to that the investigative process was facilitated by detention under Section 14 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. Section 14 procedure was very limited by a number of aspects, crucially that the suspect could only be detained once and for a maximum of 6 hours, which was horrendously limiting. Rather than tweak the existing legislation they scrubbed it and moved to a similar process to E&W where the suspect can either be arrested for questioning or formally arrested. It provides greater time limits for the police and also allows multiple arrests for questioning which as I said is completely different to what the courts recognise as "arrest without warrant".

Apologies for the long reply but I am day off, bored, and as I have spent my whole working life involved in the process, often at a very grave level, so I'm a bit vexed that my knowledge is being questioned.

Just giving my view. I’m a barrister, but in England. My understanding was that the position is the same in both E&W and S.

Police Scotland seem to agree with my understanding: see https://www.scotland.police.uk/what-s-h ... -arrested/

That page includes this:

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.

Well all I can say is that I really can't understand this. I wasn't aware of any changes being implemented after the abolition of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 which changed the Scottish procedure from detention and arrest to investigative arrest and formal arrest. Prior to that my information is certainly correct.
I was never involved in such a high profile enquiry as this (many more serious but not so much public interest) so my only defence is that it was a change in procedure I really didn't find myself needing to know, however given my investigative speciality I can only say I am genuinely surprised. If, as it appears I am wrong I can only take that on the chin and apologise if my information has been misleading.

[Paddington Bear]

It's odd. It would suggest that they can't find something that they suspect to be there or have information may be hidden there. Murrell has had months to prepare for this so you would expect he would have done his best to get rid of anything potentially incriminating.

Or, and bear with me for a second, maybe whatever it is doesn’t exist?

it's that old conflict; he's a criminal genius, but he's also stupid enough to bury the evidence in his own back garden

People tend to do really really dumb stuff when panicked by the thought of prison time, in fairness. I can’t quite work out what they’d be looking for in the garden though, surely this search is predominantly electronic.

[SaintK]

is missing you lads on PR
https://forum.planetrugby.com/viewtop ... =104969

[Biffer]

Bless him. He’s wanking really, really hard about this stuff right now, you can see on that thread that he’s desperate for someone to argue with him so he can spend weeks harassing them non stop. What a cunt of a man he is.

The link to the thread about Sturgeons resignation also shows how few Scot’s there are left on that board and how little they understand what goes on up here.

[Blackmac]

Bless him. He’s wanking really, really hard about this stuff right now, you can see on that thread that he’s desperate for someone to argue with him so he can spend weeks harassing them non stop. What a cunt of a man he is.

The link to the thread about Sturgeons resignation also shows how few Scot’s there are left on that board and how little they understand what goes on up here.

Bimbo and the like were the main reason I left. Okay we can have disagreements on here but they are generally well mannered debates where we can agree to disagree. Trying to make any sort of point across there, no matter how valid, was just depressing and the anti Scottish agenda from some was extraordinary.

[Biffer]

Bless him. He’s wanking really, really hard about this stuff right now, you can see on that thread that he’s desperate for someone to argue with him so he can spend weeks harassing them non stop. What a cunt of a man he is.

The link to the thread about Sturgeons resignation also shows how few Scot’s there are left on that board and how little they understand what goes on up here.

Bimbo and the like were the main reason I left. Okay we can have disagreements on here but they are generally well mannered debates where we can agree to disagree. Trying to make any sort of point across there, no matter how valid, was just depressing and the anti Scottish agenda from some was extraordinary.

Same here. He and others make it a deeply unpleasant place to be.

[shaggy]

Now the SNP auditors have resigned.

[weegie01]

Now the SNP auditors have resigned.

Although being reported as if it has just happened, they resigned a good while ago.

[tc27]

WRT the digging it was just the police moving spades apparently.

The auditors are just the latest in the list of those who have resigned or stood aside. Something really odd going on.

[Blackmac]

Now the SNP auditors have resigned.

Although being reported as if it has just happened, they resigned a good while ago.

Doesn't appear as if they have been doing much of a job anyway

[Blackmac]

PSOS have seized a £110000 motorhome from Murrell's parents house. The only reasons I can think of are it's either been seized under warrant to be searched, used in the commission of a crime, which is unlikely, or they can directly link it to the proceeds of crime.

[weegie01]

It was pointed out to me this morning that the resignation of the auditors has a small chance of signalling the end of the SNP, and in the best case is a disaster.

In the auditing world, having your auditors resign is major. Other firms would have been circumspect in picking the SNP as a client anyway, but with the adverse publicity swirling around, they may struggle to get anyone to take on the job. Which means they can't file accounts, which means they fail one of the statutory regulations of the Electoral Commission that allows them to operate.

I am sure there will be come firm willing to take on the SNP as an audit client. Unlike Labour and the Tories which are quite big businesses, it is after all a small operation that there are many, many firms capable of taking on. But anyone who does it will do so on punitive terms and conduct a far more rigourous audit than normal to protect their own reputations.

[shaggy]

It was pointed out to me this morning that the resignation of the auditors has a small chance of signalling the end of the SNP, and in the best case is a disaster.

In the auditing world, having your auditors resign is major. Other firms would have been circumspect in picking the SNP as a client anyway, but with the adverse publicity swirling around, they may struggle to get anyone to take on the job. Which means they can't file accounts, which means they fail one of the statutory regulations of the Electoral Commission that allows them to operate.

I am sure there will be come firm willing to take on the SNP as an audit client. Unlike Labour and the Tories which are quite big businesses, it is after all a small operation that there are many, many firms capable of taking on. But anyone who does it will do so on punitive terms and conduct a far more rigourous audit than normal to protect their own reputations.

Very unlikely to be unable to find a new auditor. There must be many firms of sufficient size that are pro independence and would be willing to take on such a client.

[tc27]

It was pointed out to me this morning that the resignation of the auditors has a small chance of signalling the end of the SNP, and in the best case is a disaster.

In the auditing world, having your auditors resign is major. Other firms would have been circumspect in picking the SNP as a client anyway, but with the adverse publicity swirling around, they may struggle to get anyone to take on the job. Which means they can't file accounts, which means they fail one of the statutory regulations of the Electoral Commission that allows them to operate.

I am sure there will be come firm willing to take on the SNP as an audit client. Unlike Labour and the Tories which are quite big businesses, it is after all a small operation that there are many, many firms capable of taking on. But anyone who does it will do so on punitive terms and conduct a far more rigourous audit than normal to protect their own reputations.

Very unlikely to be unable to find a new auditor. There must be many firms of sufficient size that are pro independence and would be willing to take on such a client.

I am sure they can find one regardless of the auditors political views (I work for a company that has the SNP as a client and it doesn't bother me at all).

As Weegue points out though the new auditors will have to go through the accounts with a fine toothcomb in order to be seen as credible as they are currently the subject of a criminal investigation.

[Biffer]

So are the suitors quitting because they think stuff was hidden from them and the trust is gone or are they quitting because they were too fucking useless to see what was going on?

[Line6 HXFX]

So there is litterally no route to independence now, unless the SNP gets a majority in Westminster?
Tories won give them a referendum, Labour won't.

I mean they may as well have party with the cash, get the cocaine covered hookers in, and say feck it.

Imagine donating to a political party, the no1 objective of which is unattainable..through the democratic process..


That's the bigger scandal.

[Blackmac]

So there is litterally no route to indpendnece now, unless the SNP gets a majority in Westminster?
Tories won give them a referendum, Labour won't.

I mean they may as well have party with the cash, get the cocaine covered hookers in, and say feck it.

Imagine donating to a political party, the no1 objective of which is unattainable..
That's the bigger scandal.

Not a silly as donating to pay Murrell's legal fees, for which the begging bowl is currently out.

[westport]

It was pointed out to me this morning that the resignation of the auditors has a small chance of signalling the end of the SNP, and in the best case is a disaster.

In the auditing world, having your auditors resign is major. Other firms would have been circumspect in picking the SNP as a client anyway, but with the adverse publicity swirling around, they may struggle to get anyone to take on the job. Which means they can't file accounts, which means they fail one of the statutory regulations of the Electoral Commission that allows them to operate.

I am sure there will be come firm willing to take on the SNP as an audit client. Unlike Labour and the Tories which are quite big businesses, it is after all a small operation that there are many, many firms capable of taking on. But anyone who does it will do so on punitive terms and conduct a far more rigourous audit than normal to protect their own reputations.

If they can't get one then one is appointed to them.