DARK MONEY

I participated in an important debate on ‘Dark Money’, secured by my colleague, Martin Docherty-Hughes.

I questioned the bizarre failure of Labour Councillors abstaining on an SNP motion at a recent full council meeting in North Ayrshire Council, calling for transparency in party donations of £100 made to the Tories during the 2016 Holyrood election campaign. This donation broke electoral law, according to the Electoral Commission. However, Labour’s lack of concern about the Tories’ apparent disregard of electoral law raises yet more questions about the much denied but very clear informal confidence and supply arrangements between the Tory and Labour parties in North Ayrshire Council and elsewhere.

Interestingly in Westminster, no Labour MPs attended this debate on the Tories’ dark money donations in Scotland and their breaking of electoral law. I cannot imagine why.