Alex Massie Alex Massie

Sleaze, cronyism and the SNP: the New Politics is charmingly familiar

The great thing about the ‘new politics’ – or at least the new politics we have lately been privileged to endure here in Scotland – is that it’s just as fetid and grubby as the old politics it replaced. The band may change but the music remains the same.

Consider the twin controversies swirling around the SNP. Neither, on its own, is enough to torpedo Nicola Sturgeon but, combined, they represent the largest challenge to her authority the First Minister has yet encountered.

First there is the curious case of Michelle Thompson, the MP for Edinburgh West. Mrs Thomson was previously managing director of the ‘Business for Scotland’ group arguing for a Yes vote in last year’s independence referendum. She received glowing endorsements – not least for her business nous – from senior figures within the party.

Awkwardly, it turns out that a considerable part of her business appears to have involved purchasing properties from desperate sellers at below market valuations. In 2009, for instance, Mrs Thomson and her husband bought an Edinburgh flat from a pensioner couple needing a quick sale on account of the husband having been diagnosed with bowel cancer. The Thomsons bought the property for £73,000 but, oddly, the Land Register records the sales price as being £105,000. “We needed the money”, the previous owner said. “We knew that we would take a loss, but we were desperate. I knew I was being taken advantage of, but we were about to get our home dispossessed.” Another seller in financial difficulty sold his flat to the Thomsons for around £60,000 and is surprised – to put it mildly – that the sale price was registered as being £85,000″. “I never got anything like that”, he says.

The Thomson’s solicitor, Christopher Hales, was struck off in May 2014 for professional misconduct, much of it centring on work he did for the Thomsons.

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