2017: Stonewall and Woke obsessed Nicola Sturgeon and her similarly affected Civil Servants decide upon a strategy designed to rid Holyrood of anyone guity of harassment
In the Autumn of 2017, Nicola Sturgeon instructed Leslie Evans to complete a review of the harassment policy of the Government and if required, to bring forward proposals for change drafting revised procedures in line with the Scottish Government’s transparency in government drive.
The review was completed and the consensus was that the existing procedures required very little updating but for no identifiable reason a decision was taken to write up new procedures which when in place would render the long standing and successful ” fairness at Work” policy redundant.
James Hynd: Head of Cabinet, Parliament and Governance Division, Scottish Government was the lead officer of the review process and subsequent update of the Scottish Government policy on handling harassment complaints replacing tried and tested “Fairness at Work” procedures that had been in place for many years initially encompassing current Ministers, then expanding it introducing a new unique procedure for receiving and resolving complaints of harassment against former Minsters without the required authority of the UK Government.
Ignoring all warnings the new procedures were signed off by Nicola Sturgeon in late December 2017. Less than 2 weeks later, in January 2018, two complainants came forward with allegations of harassment against Alex Salmond under the new rules.
it appeared there had been “malice aforethought” and the complainants had been waiting for the new rules to come into force since no effort had been made by them to register allegations over the past 4 years. The complainants alleged incidents they said had occurred in 2013 (four years before).
2020: Sturgeon was accused of misleading MSPs when she gave evidence about the sexual misconduct probe into Alec Salmond, after failing to recall when she first heard about the allegations
Irish lawyer, James Hamilton was commissioned to independently investigate the accusation Nicola Sturgeon had breached the ministerial code by misleading MSPs over her involvement in the botched investigation of sexual misconduct claims against Alex Salmond.
John Swinney arranged the secondment of a secretariat of Civil Servants to assist Mr Hamilton in his investigations. Their names were kept secret.
The Hamilton report said she had not breached the code, but he left it up to her peers to decide if they had been misled.
2025: A Freedom of information request inadvertently revealed Hynd to be a coordinating officer of the supposedly independent Civil Servant secretariat that assisted Hamilton.
In August 2020, Hynd wrote to the government’s Handling of Harassment Complaints committee. Claiming to be working for Mr Hamilton he wrote: “As you know, the Convener wrote to James Hamilton, the independent adviser on the Scottish Ministerial Code on 7 July. he has asked that I pass on to you his response, as attached. For the avoidance of doubt, I am sending this on Mr Hamilton’s behalf as the independent adviser and not on behalf of the Scottish Government. We are planning to put in place a secretariat to support Mr Hamilton during the referral. Until that is in place I am happy to liaise with Mr Hamilton as required.”
The impartiality of the Hamilton report is in doubt since Hynd, the architect of the botched harassment policy is currently being investigated by the police, (Operation Broadcroft) for allegedly lying under oath to the Salmond Inquiry.
Swinney has spent £118,000 of public cash, to date, in defence of his view that the Scottish Government has a right to refuse to release the Hamilton report to the public despite being ordered to do so by the court. He is the law!!!!
Kenny MacAskill, the Leader of “Alba” commented: “It gets murkier and murkier. Deliberate obfuscation, inappropriate redaction and now individuals with clear conflicts of interest appointed to critical positions. There has to be end to this cover up and individuals must be held to account. Both Ministers and senior officials must be fully held to account and that requires full disclosure”
A summary of a press article written by David Walker politics reporter of the Daily Express
The report and supporting documents are attached
caltonjock 