The SNP leadership was branded secretive, evasive and menacing by Joanna Cherry in her scathing resignation letter after she quit the party’s ruling committee, it has been reported.
The prominent Nationalist MP condemned the secrecy around the state of the party’s finances when she dramatically stood down in 2021.
In a damning assessment of the SNP hierarchy, Ms Cherry warned they were ‘secretive and evasive’ about financial affairs, meaning it was ‘impossible’ for her to improve transparency and scrutiny as promised.
The letter also complains of a ‘menacing atmosphere’ within the National Executive Committee (NEC).
The revelation follows a disastrous week for the Nationalists in which Nicola Sturgeon’s home was raided, her husband Peter Murrell arrested and the SNP’s headquarters searched in connection with a police investigation into the party’s financial affairs.
Speaking out: Joanna Cherry has been a long-standing critic of the SNP leadership
Former leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) Nicola Sturgeon speaking to the media outside her home in Uddingston
Police have been probing the SNP’s books after complaints that some cash donated to fight another independence referendum was allegedly not in the party’s accounts.
Former chief executive Mr Murrell was arrested on Wednesday and released without charge ‘pending further investigation’.
The hierarchy, including Ms Sturgeon and party president Michael Russell, has repeatedly denied that any money was ‘missing’.
But Ms Cherry’s explanation for quitting the NEC in 2021 reveals long-standing concerns about how transparent the SNP has been with its finances.
She told the party’s business convener, Kirsten Oswald MP, that she was ‘very concerned at the lack of adherence to the party’s constitution, the cavalier attitude towards legal advice and fiduciary duties’.
She added: ‘Over the years I have sat on a number of management boards and I have never seen business conducted in such an inadequate way as it is on the SNP NEC.
‘Nor have I experienced the menacing atmosphere in which the business is conducted.’
Ms Cherry left the post just days after the departure of Douglas Chapman as party treasurer, saying that he ‘had not received the support or financial information required’ to carry out his duties in the role.
In her resignation letter, leaked to The Sunday Times, Ms Cherry argued she could not fulfil her promise to members to ‘deliver better scrutiny and transparency’ because of the party’s reticence to open the books.
Ms Cherry left the post just days after the departure of Douglas Chapman as party treasurer
The Edinburgh South West MP wrote: ‘Due to the secretive and evasive manner in which business is conducted in our party it has proved impossible for me to do the job I was elected to do.’
The police began investigating the whereabouts of donations worth almost £667,000 after accounts showed only £97,000 in the bank at the end of 2019 and total assets of about £272,000.
It was previously revealed that Mr Murrell gave the SNP a loan of £107,620 in June 2021 ‘to assist with cashflow’ and the party then broke electoral law by failing to declare it on time.
Approximately £60,000 of the loan was still outstanding in October of that year, according to the latest accounts.
Asked whether the loan would be repaid, new party leader Humza Yousaf last week said: ‘That, of course, would be the intention.’
It also emerged last week that the SNP’s accountants had quit as police ramped up their fraud investigation, plunging the party into further turmoil. The SNP launched a search for new accountants prepared to work with the party after Johnston Carmichael, which had audited its books for more than a decade, dropped it as a client.
Scottish Conservative chairman Craig Hoy said: ‘The SNP should have promptly suspended Peter Murrell at the start of the investigation into his management of the SNP’s finances’
Scottish Conservative constitution spokesman Donald Cameron said: ‘The extraordinary events of recent weeks leave the SNP with big questions to answer, and their auditors’ resignation only adds to the growing number of issues they must address.
‘The public are sick of the SNP shrouding matters relating to their finances behind a wall of secrecy, and senior figures – including Humza Yousaf and Nicola Sturgeon – must be upfront about this situation.’
Ms Cherry has been a vocal critic of the party’s leadership in recent years, claiming it ‘wasn’t a team effort’.
Speaking to journalists about the state of the SNP last week, Mr Yousaf said: ‘It is very, very clear that the governance in the party was not as it should be.
‘But clearly there is now an opportunity with a new chief executive to do things differently.’ The SNP’s decision to allow Mr Murrell to continue at the helm of the SNP after police launched their investigation has also been criticised by opponents.
Scottish Conservative chairman Craig Hoy said: ‘The SNP should have promptly suspended Peter Murrell at the start of the investigation into his management of the SNP’s finances.
‘The party’s refusal to do so shows the SNP’s reluctance to be open and transparent about where the money went and who knew about its murky finances.’