:00:13. > :00:16.is not much governments can do about it. Good evening.
:00:17. > :00:20.He refers himself to an investigation as to whether he
:00:21. > :00:25.broke the ministerial code if conduct, and still the insults fly,
:00:25. > :00:29.but will there be any lasting damage to brand SNP?
:00:29. > :00:32.And more revelations of what the company that ran Rangers' in
:00:32. > :00:36.administration knew about the controversial deal but financed
:00:36. > :00:39.Craig Whyte's takeover of the Ibrox club. First, they lost their anti-
:00:39. > :00:42.Nato policy. Then they lost two backbench MSPs. And after two days
:00:42. > :00:46.of truly awful headlines, the SNP must have wondered if they were
:00:46. > :00:49.also about to lose the trust of the voters. The row over whether Alex
:00:49. > :00:52.Salmond had obtained legal advice about EU membership exposed the
:00:52. > :00:54.First Minister to unrelenting personal attacks - he is a bare-
:00:54. > :01:04.faced liar, as straight as a corkscrew, as honest as Richard
:01:04. > :01:14.
:01:14. > :01:19.Nixon. So what damage, if any, have such attacks done to brand SNP?
:01:19. > :01:27.Arriving at Holyrood, I appeared unfazed by the week's events and
:01:27. > :01:31.ready to ride out any further turbulence. Having lost two MSPs
:01:31. > :01:35.over an independent Scotland's stance on NATO, he knew a storm was
:01:35. > :01:40.brewing over whether his government had sought legal advice about
:01:40. > :01:43.Scotland's future in Europe. I would like to ask the First
:01:43. > :01:47.Minister a familiar question about whether a separate Scotland would
:01:47. > :01:51.be a member of the EU. It is a question Andrew Neil asked him on
:01:51. > :01:57.4th March. Have you sought advice from your own Scottish law officers
:01:57. > :02:03.in this matter? Starting his answer with the words "we have, yes", but
:02:03. > :02:08.the First Minister please get to "no, we haven't" in 27 words?
:02:08. > :02:12.First Minister was ready and waiting with the answer. He had it
:02:12. > :02:15.sorted. An independent panel is to investigate if he broke the
:02:15. > :02:20.ministerial code of conduct. finding of the independent advisers
:02:20. > :02:25.will be made public. I will accept, and I hope members of the chamber
:02:25. > :02:31.will do the same. I would observe that there have been five
:02:31. > :02:35.references since I have been First Minister. Each one has found in
:02:35. > :02:39.favour that the ministerial code has been abided by. I hope on this
:02:39. > :02:44.6th occasion, given that I have said I will accept the findings,
:02:44. > :02:48.that the opposition parties will find themselves able to do the same.
:02:48. > :02:53.We in minutes, the insults were being hurled across the debating
:02:53. > :02:59.chamber. I suppose you can't expect a straight answer from a First
:02:59. > :03:03.Minister who is as straight as a corkscrew. After five years in
:03:03. > :03:12.office, was our First Minister no more trustworthy than the nation's
:03:12. > :03:17.best-loved wide-boy? Or do. We have had more Beckingham diving and Del
:03:17. > :03:23.Boy from this man. -- more ducking and diving than Del Boy from this
:03:23. > :03:27.man. Every fair-minded person has reached the conclusion that he
:03:27. > :03:30.misled his country into believing his case that Scotland's case for
:03:30. > :03:35.Europe was based on proper legal advice. Alex Salmond has always
:03:35. > :03:39.punched above his weight in media terms for. Named politician of the
:03:39. > :03:46.year last year by both the Spectator magazine and the Herald.
:03:46. > :03:50.A former MSP strategist says this storm will soon pass. We are seeing
:03:50. > :03:57.an extremely into private debate, with a lot of abuse being thrown
:03:57. > :04:02.around -- it is an intemperate debate with a lot of noise going on.
:04:02. > :04:06.But if you look at surveys consistently over the years, for
:04:06. > :04:10.example, the Social attitudes survey, they showed a great deal of
:04:10. > :04:15.trust in the Scottish government. These are deep-seated feelings, so
:04:15. > :04:18.the fact that it has been a difficult week and the fact that
:04:18. > :04:21.Alex Salmond has been abused roundly by his opponents, I would
:04:21. > :04:27.not have thought that that will suddenly negate the build-up of
:04:27. > :04:30.trust that was evident in the last Scottish Parliament elections. The
:04:30. > :04:35.pair is has revelled in an opportunity to give the First
:04:35. > :04:39.Minister a doing. So have the headline writers got a point? Is
:04:39. > :04:45.the Sam and brand tarnished irreparably, or will the sheen soon
:04:45. > :04:50.be back? The SNP brand has been very much shaped around the cult of
:04:50. > :04:55.Alex Salmond. He has done a fantastic job, but now he needs to
:04:55. > :05:01.accept that he should delegate responsibility and some of the
:05:02. > :05:05.front of house responsibility. When it becomes so closely defined by a
:05:05. > :05:09.single individual, you will suffer if that person has a bad week in
:05:09. > :05:14.the office. Look at the Republicans in the States. When Romney had a
:05:14. > :05:22.bad week in the office, his whole party suffers and the media turns
:05:22. > :05:25.against him. There is no doubt it has not been his easiest week, but
:05:25. > :05:33.Alex Salmond would probably say being called a corkscrew is not the
:05:33. > :05:37.worst blow he has had to fend off. Will it proved to be a watershed
:05:37. > :05:41.moment, or did no one emerged from today's about having landed a
:05:41. > :05:43.killer blow? I am joined now by David Torrance,
:05:43. > :05:51.Alex Salmond's biographer, who is in London tonight, and from
:05:51. > :05:59.Edinburgh by Iain MacWhirter of the Herald. Iain MacWhirter, you get
:05:59. > :06:03.the award for instant cliche. He described it as a Norman Ebor. It
:06:03. > :06:07.was certainly shaping up that way. This is the best opportunity the
:06:07. > :06:13.opposition has had, I would say, since Alex Salmond has been in
:06:13. > :06:21.office. We had this very potentially dangerous coincidence
:06:21. > :06:24.of episodes this week of resignations and the disclosure of
:06:24. > :06:31.the results of the consultation on the referendum question. And then
:06:31. > :06:36.of course we had this omnishambles over the unit advice. But you have
:06:36. > :06:40.to hand it to Alex Salmond. He slipped away very effectively. He
:06:40. > :06:44.deployed the oldest device in the book, an independent panel, which
:06:44. > :06:48.will inevitably conclude that he has not broken the ministerial code.
:06:48. > :06:55.That was not the issue. He was not disclosing anything, because there
:06:55. > :06:57.was nothing to disclose. The whole scandal was the way they had taken
:06:57. > :07:01.the information commissioner to court to prevent the disclosure of
:07:01. > :07:06.the fact that the Government knew nothing. The David Torrance, do you
:07:06. > :07:11.agree that he will inevitably be acquitted by the three eminent
:07:11. > :07:15.personages who look into this? the ministerial code inquiry is a
:07:15. > :07:19.red herring. I don't remember anyone having a go at him for
:07:19. > :07:25.breaking the ministerial code. It is a device he has deployed before,
:07:25. > :07:29.and he will come up trumps. The problem Alex Salmond and the SNP
:07:29. > :07:33.have his and the longer term. Labour have an obvious strategy of
:07:33. > :07:37.depicting Alex Salmond as a liar, a word that even his political
:07:37. > :07:43.opponents don't use lightly. They are hoping to cement this
:07:43. > :07:47.impression in the minds of voters. But that only works if it is
:07:47. > :07:52.fuelled by other examples over the weeks and months ahead, where it
:07:52. > :07:57.looks like I is being less than straightforward. At the moment, I
:07:57. > :08:01.don't see it holding. We had lots of phoney away from Labour and the
:08:01. > :08:05.Conservatives today, but for that to resonate with voters, it has to
:08:05. > :08:09.reflect what they are thinking. This is not an easy to understand
:08:09. > :08:13.row, crucially. Andrew Mitchell having a go at police officers on
:08:13. > :08:17.Downing Street was something everyone could understand and
:08:17. > :08:24.everyone understood it was wrong, and thus he resigned. This is about
:08:24. > :08:29.legal advice and the European Union. I'd barely keep track of it.
:08:29. > :08:33.that a good point, Iain MacWhirter? The Scotsman and the Herald are not
:08:34. > :08:38.leading on this tomorrow. There is a side bar at the top of the
:08:38. > :08:44.Scotsman. I presume if you are I, you actually want to see nothing
:08:44. > :08:49.about yourself on the front page? Absolutely. That is an indication
:08:49. > :08:53.that they have killed the story. It is interesting to see the way they
:08:53. > :09:00.did it. Alex Salmond is very good at batting away criticism. Labour
:09:00. > :09:06.made the fatal mistake by saying he was a bare-faced liar, when they
:09:07. > :09:10.can't really justify that. Then he had this device of the panel.
:09:10. > :09:16.Nicola Sturgeon worked effectively here as well by effectively
:09:16. > :09:19.apologising on his behalf this morning on the radio. She said it
:09:19. > :09:25.was unfortunate that this impression had got out but they had
:09:26. > :09:31.legal advice when they didn't. She managed to deflect that criticism.
:09:31. > :09:36.I do not think the branch is at issue. Curiously, there has always
:09:36. > :09:40.been a slight cancer element in Alex Salmond's brand, and that is
:09:40. > :09:46.partly why people like him -- he has a Chancellor element. There is
:09:46. > :09:56.an edgy way to the manner in which he can do its political affairs. It
:09:56. > :09:59.
:09:59. > :10:04.De you agree with that, David Torrance? Is his slipperiness and
:10:04. > :10:10.asset? And not necessarily that but it is expected of him and I think
:10:10. > :10:14.that a lot of Scots quite like it. Look at his approval ratings.
:10:14. > :10:18.Astonishingly high especially when set against the UK party leaders in
:10:18. > :10:23.Scotland, it has been slightly slipping of late but it is still
:10:23. > :10:26.strong. And when politicians are popular - and let's face it, not
:10:26. > :10:31.many are genuinely popular - voters are inclined to give them the
:10:31. > :10:36.benefit of the doubt so even if it looks like Alex Salmond has not
:10:36. > :10:39.been entirely straight forward on this matter, and especially when
:10:39. > :10:44.voters cannot follow what is going on, it is complicated, they will
:10:44. > :10:49.give him the benefit of the doubt and moved on quickly. I remember a
:10:49. > :10:53.similar period towards the end of 2010 when the Scottish Parliament
:10:53. > :10:58.have lost its tax-raising powers and other things and it was written
:10:58. > :11:02.off as the SNP's worst week and it was forgotten within a few weeks.
:11:03. > :11:06.And a few months later, they won an overall majority. And Iain
:11:06. > :11:16.Macwhirter, do you think we have seen a template for what feels see
:11:16. > :11:24.in the next two years? Absolutely. -- for what we will see in the next
:11:24. > :11:28.two years. He is always basically, what he is saying about
:11:28. > :11:33.independence does not stand up and that he is vulnerable on that but I
:11:33. > :11:37.think this is an interesting moment in the history of this are very
:11:37. > :11:41.successful SNP administration. This week we are beginning to see the
:11:41. > :11:46.SNP becoming vulnerable to the kinds of mid- term pressures that
:11:46. > :11:56.affect all governments which have been in power long time and that is
:11:56. > :11:58.
:11:58. > :12:03.an important moment. The BBC has obtained evidence that Craig Whyte
:12:03. > :12:10.misled HMRC. The recording of a conversation between David Greir
:12:10. > :12:20.and that Mr Whyte shows Mr David Greir to release a misleading
:12:20. > :12:20.
:12:20. > :13:32.Apology for the loss of subtitles for 71 seconds
:13:32. > :13:35.statement by a Craig Whyte. This is Mark Daly is the BBC's
:13:35. > :13:41.investigation team member who got the recording. They had been
:13:41. > :13:46.recording, what happened next? next day, this e-mail arrived in to
:13:46. > :13:50.Craig Whyte's in box from a hot my account purporting to belong to a
:13:50. > :13:59.Ted Smith. This statement is unsurprising my supportive of the
:13:59. > :14:03.job that Duff and Phelps were doing as administrators but nobody had
:14:03. > :14:09.knowledge of the fall arrangements at the time of the acquisition of
:14:09. > :14:13.the club but we now know that not to be true and Whyte never did
:14:13. > :14:16.agree to make this statement and the e-mail were hidden away for a
:14:17. > :14:26.rainy day at. So that press release was never issued? But was never
:14:27. > :14:28.
:14:28. > :14:31.made. Is this not a rather odd situation in a legal case?
:14:31. > :14:41.might remember that Duff and Phelps had already instituted legal
:14:41. > :14:46.
:14:46. > :14:52.proceedings against the London legal firm, Collyer Bristow. Team
:14:52. > :15:02.at Duff and Phelps on the left there, Paul Clark, David White
:15:02. > :15:03.
:15:03. > :15:07.House alongside David David Greir, they want �25 million from Collyer
:15:07. > :15:10.Bristow and they say that the deal was being quietly funded by ticket
:15:10. > :15:16.money and that that deal effectively blocked any
:15:16. > :15:19.consideration of a rival bid which might have netted the club's
:15:20. > :15:25.creditors �25 million. That is where it gets interesting because
:15:25. > :15:29.now, Collyer Bristow are preparing an action which means that if
:15:29. > :15:33.successful, David Greir, the man we heard on the tape will be
:15:33. > :15:37.transferred to the other side and become a defendant alongside
:15:37. > :15:43.Collyer Bristow because they believe that he was just as
:15:43. > :15:48.culpable for the catastrophic deal to buy ranges in as much as that he
:15:48. > :15:53.knew that cricketers were funding the takeover. If successful, it
:15:53. > :15:58.would result in a preposterous an area -- knew that ticket holders
:15:58. > :16:03.were funding. Duff and Phelps brought the action in the first
:16:03. > :16:08.place, but would be being bought out. Duff and Phelps taking action
:16:08. > :16:13.for money against a lawyer on with dependent on the other side who
:16:13. > :16:18.would be one of the senior partners of the company taking senior action.
:16:18. > :16:22.They would like to bring David Greir as a co-defendant in this
:16:22. > :16:28.action and if successful, David Greir or Duff and Phelps would end
:16:28. > :16:31.up paying out in the end. What do Duff and Phelps say? The release a
:16:32. > :16:35.short statement almost identical to the statement they released last
:16:35. > :16:39.night saying that Duff and Phelps pertains that our conduct was
:16:39. > :16:44.carried out to the highest professional standards. They do not
:16:44. > :16:51.respond to information taken out of context and we believe that is the
:16:51. > :16:56.case in the BBC stories. As we have said previously, were built, the --
:16:56. > :17:02.as was said previously we welcome a look at these comments. Starting
:17:02. > :17:12.with The Scotsman on the front pages, that a boy, 14, punched
:17:12. > :17:12.
:17:12. > :17:18.other people to death in class. The Herald, foreign killers on the
:17:18. > :17:23.loose and police demand action and the Financial Times leads with the