It was an excoriating attack on the cash for access scandal that has engulfed the Labour government.
Stephen Flynn, one of the most senior figures in the SNP, wrote scathingly about what a ‘filthy-rich donor’ got in return for paying for clothes and glasses for Sir Keir Starmer.
The straight-talking SNP Westminster leader used his column in a red-top tabloid last month to question why a millionaire Prime Minister can’t foot the bill for his own ‘suits and specs’.
‘Now, I don’t know about you,’ he wrote. ‘But I get a little stressed at the thought of having to thank a family member for buying me the wrong jumper for a birthday, let alone a super-rich donor buying the specs I’d be wearing in front of a watching public.
‘Of course, it’s important to say that such clothing gifts come with no attachments. No, none at all. They are all just from the kindness of a filthy-rich donor’s heart. I mean, who doesn’t have friends like that?
The SNP’s Stephen Flynn wrote scathingly about what a ‘filthy-rich donor’ got in return for paying for clothes for the Prime Minister
Flynn’s office received a £30,000 donation to his local constituency branch from Allan MacAskill, co-chief technical officer of Edinburgh-based Flotation Energy
‘But aside from the scale of how weird and out of touch this all is, it doesn’t half stick in the throat right now.’
Regardless of political viewpoint, his words would have touched a nerve with many voters. After all, how many of us get suits and glasses bought for us from a super-wealthy donor? And is it really feasible that they would expect nothing in return?
But, it seems, Flynn’s words are now coming back to haunt him.
For he is now facing questions about what he offered in return for a massive political donation to his party ahead of his campaign to hold his Aberdeen South seat – the stench of which has refused to go away.
And, while typically forthright and vocal about Labour’s woes, there has been a deafening silence from him over whether the donation came ‘with strings attached’.
Unless answers are forthcoming, the scandal could forever cast a cloud over the career of the man regarded by some as the SNP’s likely next leader.
What is beyond doubt is that Flynn received a £30,000 donation to his local constituency branch from Allan MacAskill, co-chief technical officer of Edinburgh-based Flotation Energy, the firm behind the giant Green Volt project off the Aberdeenshire coast which is set to become the world’s biggest floating wind farm.
The cash was accepted on May 27, weeks after the scheme secured consent from the Scottish Government.
Private emails between Flynn and SNP ministers show he contacted Energy Minister Gillian Martin last October to highlight correspondence from Flotation Energy’s chief technology officer urging him to help set up a ministerial meeting to break the ‘consent logjam’ impacting the project.
Flotation Energy is behind a huge offshore windfarm project
He had urged officials to review the correspondence and, if appropriate, ‘arrange contact with those involved to discuss these matters further’.
Ms Martin’s assistant private secretary then asked for a ‘fast track’ approach to be taken to reviewing the issue.
The emails shared with Ms Martin, signed off from Flotation’s ‘chief technology officer’ – whose name has been redacted but title is the same one as Mr MacAskill has used in the past before more recently being described as ‘co-chief technical officer’ by the company – show he contacted Flynn on Monday, September 25, following a discussion they had the previous Friday.
It said: ‘Stephen, Further yo (to) our discussion on Friday we need a ministerial meeting to break consent logjam.’
In a follow-up email sent to Flynn later the same day, the Flotation Energy official highlighted a series of other detailed issues related to the application process, and said: ‘I hope the comments below from (redacted) show why we need ministerial intervention by the Scottish government.
‘The green volt project has little environmental impact but represent huge technical and commercial opportunity for northeast Scotland, Scotland and the UK.
‘It will see one of the first commercial floating wind farms constructed in Scotland with the project driven out of Aberdeen.
‘Simultaneously it will save a hundreds of thousand tonnes of carbon emission from a number of North Sea oilfields.’
Flynn is facing questions as to whether the donation came with strings attached
Flynn, who plays on his chummy working-class image and was used heavily by SNP strategists in the general election campaign as the antidote to strait-laced and somewhat dour leader John Swinney, has been notably silent on key questions about this and has refused to answer whether he received the donation in return for lobbying on behalf of the Green Volt project.
It has led critics to raise questions about just what he has to hide about this issue, and he has been urged to publish all the correspondence he has had with ministers and Mr MacAskill over the issue, including texts and WhatsApp messages.
Flynn is a wily political campaigner who knows how to get his way. He showed this when he was part of the coup which led to his predecessor Ian Blackford being ousted, paving the way for him to take on the top job.
Surely he knows that silence will not make questions about this donation go away?
Flynn’s wealthy benefactor Mr MacAskill is well-known in SNP circles as a long-time supporter, and is the brother of former SNP Justice Secretary and ex Alba MP Kenny MacAskill.
He was described as ‘the father of Scottish onshore wind’ by the former First Minister Alex Salmond, and has been involved in offshore wind technology for two decades, dating back to the Beatrice project off the Caithness coast which he pioneered in 2005.
He founded Flotation Energy in Scotland in 2018 with the former Liberal Democrat Deputy First Minister Nicol Stephen, who now sits in the House of Lords.
The development at the centre of the row will consist of 35 giant turbines off the coast of Peterhead. Green Volt is a 50/50 joint venture between Flotation Energy and Norwegian firm Vargronn and could lead to £3 billion of investment and the creation of hundreds of jobs.
Mr MacAskill and other senior figures at Flotation will be hoping that Green Volt can help turn around the finances of the firm, which posted a loss of more than £3 million in 2023 following a £2.2 million deficit the previous year but now has net assets judged to be worth £87 million, according to its latest annual accounts.
Sources close to Flynn claim it little surprise that a politically active businessman would donate to Flynn’s campaign given his long-term support of the party. Yet several factors mark out this political philanthropy by Mr MacAskill as unusual.
The Electoral Commission lists this perfectly legitimate £30,000 donation to Mr Flynn’s Aberdeen South and North Kincardine constituency branch as the one and only political donation he has made.
Flynn lists it on his MP register of interests, with the entry added on August 2 stating that the money was received by his local party organisation or indirectly via a central party organisation.
According to the register of interests, Mr MacAskill has not made any donations to other MPs this term or in the last term prior to the election.
Indeed, he didn’t offer up any funding to his brother during his five years in parliament.
This was the largest individual donation ever made to an SNP constituency branch, according to the Electoral Commission website. It was also an unusually large windfall for Flynn.
No similar donations have been added to his MP register of interests after or prior to the general election.
The windfall came at a time that the SNP as a whole was struggling to attract donations.
At the point that the donation was accepted by Flynn’s constituency branch in late May, the SNP central party had received cash from just two donors, one who handed over £12,000 and the other just over £44,000, since the turn of the year.
The donation made to Mr Flynn’s office has been defended as being ‘properly made and declared for political campaigning’ by First Minister John Swinney
This was a huge amount of money handed to him which could provide a significant boost to his efforts to hold his Aberdeen South seat against the backdrop of heavy losses up and down the country for his party.
It is not known exactly how much of Mr MacAskill’s money was used in the general election campaign.
Electoral Commission rules stipulate all candidates can spend a fixed amount of £11,390, then 8p per registered parliamentary elector.
For Aberdeen South’s electorate of 65,719, that means a cap of £16,657 during the campaign period.
By comparison, Flynn’s total spending in the 2019 general election was only £9,468 – way below the spending limit.
So the donation could have allowed him to significantly ramp up spending in his ultimately successful bid to stave off a humiliating defeat in this year’s election.
The unanswered question remains: did this lucrative donation come with strings attached?
Neither Flotation Energy nor Mr MacAskill appear on the Scottish Parliament’s lobbying register – where firms need to submit details of all face-to-face lobbying activity with MSPs, ministers or special advisers – which indicates that their main hotline to ministers was via Flynn.
This was far from the only time Flynn attempted to push ministers to act on behalf of businesses or constituents.
Emails show he is regularly in contact to forward correspondence and make requests.
That is not necessarily a bad thing – it can be a sign of an active MP trying to get things done in their area.
But questions arise when he does so during a live application process and then receives a cash windfall from a businessman he is lobbying on behalf of.
A dossier of all his emails to the Scottish Government over the course of nearly two years show his interventions cover a wide range of issues, from rejected loan applications for a sports centre to waiting times in the NHS and a lack of social distancing in Covid-19 and flu vaccination centres.
In total, there are 68 emails from Flynn, the vast majority of which relate to the everyday contact MPs have from constituents on a wide range of local issues.
Three things mark out the contact about Flotation Energy as different from the rest: that this was an intervention on behalf of a business about a live Scottish Government consent process, that officials asked for a response to be fast-tracked, and that Mr Flynn’s constituency office subsequently received a very large donation from a senior official from the company he agreed to help.
The day before revelations about Flynn’s donation from Mr MacAskill following his lobbying on his behalf emerged, SNP Cabinet Office spokesman Brendan O’Hara demanded ‘a full inquiry into the Labour government’s cash for access scandal’ in a letter to UK Government ministers issued by the SNP press office.
He also raised concerns that there is ‘a growing stench of sleaze from this Labour government and public anger on this issue is not going away’.
Since revelations about Flynn emerged a week ago, the SNP has fallen silent on Labour’s scandal – and refused to expand on its initial statement which said only that he ‘will always support important projects that bring jobs and investment to Aberdeen and communities across Scotland’ and that ‘any local MP worth their salt would do everything they could to ensure vital renewable projects are delivered’.
John Swinney has also deflected questions about the issue. Asked by the Mail on Thursday if he was ‘entirely satisfied’ that Mr MacAskill’s donation to Mr Flynn’s branch was not ‘some kind of quid pro quo’, the First Minister said: ‘This was a political donation that was properly made and declared for political campaigning purposes.
‘I don’t think it should be a surprise that the Scottish Government is supportive of renewable energy projects in Scotland because that’s been at the heart of our agenda.’
Yet the concerns about the donation are not whether it was declared or not, it is whether Mr Flynn received a cash injection in return for successfully lobbying ministers on behalf of a business. On that, the SNP hierarchy and the party’s normally vocal Westminster leader have remained silent.
Until he gives clarity on whether he received the donation ‘with strings attached’, Flynn’s own words on Labour’s scandal will continue to haunt his prospects of reaching the heights that he ruthlessly strives for.
As for the hard-pressed families Flynn claims to speak for, they will be left wondering why, once again, it seems senior figures in the SNP are incapable of practising what they preach.
