They say honesty is the best policy, but there are times when a little discretion is more advisable. It’s something Scottish Conservative MSP Stephen Kerr should note, after it emerged the politician had shared some rather candid thoughts about Murdo Fraser’s leadership campaign on WhatsApp. Not only are the messages damning – Kerr publicly endorsed the leadership contender last week – but it transpires that the MSP had been posting his criticism directly to his WhatsApp statuses, meaning that, er, all of his contacts could view them. Talk about analogue in a digital age…
In a series of posts, the former chief whip at Holyrood revealed his growing disillusionment with Fraser’s campaign – only a week after the nominations for Scottish Tory leadership candidates officially opened. Expressing frustration at the contender’s plans to run an event with another endorser, Graham Simpson MSP, Kerr fumed: ‘Graham Simpson knows zilch about working with councillors.’ In a twist of the knife, Kerr added: ‘I’m beginning to wish I’d nominated Meghan.’ And in another post he simply concluded: ‘Murdo’s campaign is awful.’ Don’t hold back, Stephen!
Fraser and Simpson both claimed they hadn’t seen the updates, and initially it seemed Kerr himself hadn’t quite cottoned on to how his messages had been discovered. He told the Times on Wednesday morning that it was ‘regrettable’ that ‘part of a private conversation is taken out of context’ publicly, adding: ‘The person with whom I was having the private conversation is a close friend.’ Perhaps not close enough to warn Kerr of his seriously questionable slip-up…
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