SNP Government shelled out £60k to 'support' covid witnesses ahead of UK Inquiry

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Scottish taxpayers forked out more than £60,000 to “support” witnesses for the UK Covid Inquiry.More than £4,000 was paid to help prepare national clinical director Jason Leitch and former civil servant Ken Thomson, who admitted deleting their pandemic WhatsApps.The bill for Leitch, three other Scottish Government officials and former SNP health Secretary Jeane Freeman came to £10,532.Labour MSP Jackie Baillie said “This is an eye-watering sum of money and the SNP must explain why this was necessary.“Too often in the Covid Inquiry the SNP government has sought to obscure the truth and cover up its own failures, and it has serious questions to answer about whether that’s what this expensive legal advice was for."The Scottish end of the Inquiry was overshadowed by the scandal of how senior Government figures deleted their WhatsApp messages during covid.Former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, her then deputy John Swinney and Leitch all wiped their messages.One pandemic message that was recovered showed Leitch writing: “WhatsApp deletion is a pre-bed ritual.”The Inquiry showed Thomson, who used to be director-general for strategy and external affairs, boasting to colleagues that “plausible deniability are my middle names”.He also wrote during the pandemic: “Just to remind you (seriously), this is discoverable under FOI.

Know where the ‘clear chat’ button is…”.A freedom of information request has now revealed Leitch and Thomson were among those who received support from the legal firm Morton Fraser MacRoberts.Thomson benefited from £1180 worth of preparatory work while the figure spent on Leitch and Freeman was £3234 and £2500.Chief medical officer Dr Gregor Smith, who also deleted his WhatsApps, benefited from £2700 of