Senior SNP politician faces sexual harassment investigation

The Scottish National party was on Wednesday accused of being “mired in sleaze” after its parliamentary business manager at Westminster stepped aside while the SNP investigates a sexual harassment complaint against him.

The complaint against Patrick Grady, SNP chief whip, comes less than two months before the party contests elections to the Holyrood parliament that it hopes will provide a platform to push for its goal of Scottish independence.

It follows a bitter rift between Scottish first minister and SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon and her predecessor Alex Salmond sparked by harassment complaints against him. A Scottish government investigation into the complaints was ruled unlawful in 2019 and Salmond was last year acquitted of all 13 sexual offence charges against him.

“The SNP is mired in sleaze and [takes] the people of Scotland for granted,” said the Scottish Conservatives, citing media reports that previous concerns about Grady’s conduct had not been acted on by the party.

The Herald newspaper on Wednesday said a number of reports raising concerns about Grady’s behaviour were not fully investigated by the SNP.

It said letters were sent in 2017 and 2018 to the House of Commons’ then speaker John Bercow, containing allegations that Grady sexually harassed two male members of staff at an SNP Christmas party in London in 2016. The letters were passed to the SNP, said The Herald.

Grady did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Asked about the sexual harassment reports in the media, the SNP said it had “received a formal complaint”.

“That now allows due process to take place and we will not be commenting further while an investigation is under way,” said a party spokesperson.

A person close to the party added Grady had stepped aside as SNP chief whip at Westminster while the investigation took place.

The SNP has been criticised for slow action against former Scottish finance secretary Derek Mackay, who last year resigned just hours before his annual budget speech following media reports that he sent hundreds of messages on social media to a 16-year-old boy.

Mackay has not commented on the details of the allegations, but in a statement in February 2020 issued through the Scottish government said that he apologised unreservedly to the boy and was “sorry to have let colleagues and supporters down”.

Sturgeon last year said Mackay had been suspended from the SNP pending an investigation, but the party has made no substantive announcement since. Mackay currently sits in the Scottish parliament as an independent.

Opinion polls suggest the SNP is on course for a landslide victory in Scottish parliament elections scheduled for May 6, but many in the party fear that the rift between Sturgeon and Salmond could hurt its chances of winning an outright majority.

The SNP on Wednesday looked set to defeat a no-confidence vote in the Holyrood parliament brought by the Conservatives against deputy first minister John Swinney after the pro-independence Scottish Greens said they would not support it. 

The Conservatives have accused Swinney of failing to fully abide by parliamentary demands that the government release all the legal advice it received during its unsuccessful court defence of its investigation into the harassment complaints against Salmond.

However, the Greens said they would not back the move after Swinney agreed to the publication of some advice last week.

The advice graphically illustrated the mounting concerns of lawyers about civil servants’ late provision of information that eventually led to the government conceding that its investigation into Salmond was unlawful because it was procedurally unfair and tainted by apparent bias.

The Scottish parliament was scheduled to vote on the no-confidence motion about Swinney around 8pm on Wednesday.