There’s a huge row brewing in the UK general election campaign.
A leaked memo published by The Telegraph claims Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon told France’s ambassador to Britain that she wanted David Cameron to remain as prime minister after the 7 May vote.
The SNP, however, has indicated it would be prepared to back a minority government led by Labour’s Ed Miliband, on a vote-by-vote basis, to keep the Tories out of power.
Sturgeon, who is Scotland’s First Minister, met French ambassador Sylvie Bermann in February on the diplomat’s first visit north of the border.
The Telegraph said the note it published was written by a senior British civil servant following a confidential conversation with Pierre-Alain Coffinier, the French consul-general in Scotland, regarding the meeting.
The memo said:
Discussion appears to have focused mainly on the political situation, with the FM stating that she wouldn’t want a formal coalition with Labour; that the SNP would almost certainly have a large number of seats… that she’d rather see David Cameron remain as PM (and didn’t see Ed Miliband as PM material).
However the civil servant appeared to doubt whether this accurately conveyed Sturgeon’s meaning, adding:
I’m not sure that the FM’s tongue would be quite so loose on that kind of thing in a meeting like that, so it might well be a case of something being lost in translation.
Sturgeon said today that the story was “categorically 100 percent untrue”.
A spokesman for the embassy also denied the story.
Ms Sturgeon did not tell the French ambassador about her personal political preferences with regards the future PM.
Coffinier confirmed he had spoken to the British government’s Scotland Office, but denied saying Sturgeon had voiced a preference about the election outcome.
He told AFP:
“The political situation in Britain was indeed discussed during the meeting between the French ambassador and the Scottish first minister at the end of February and I gave a report of it in general terms.
However, at no stage was a preference expressed about the result of the forthcoming British general election.
Miliband, meanwhile, said the Telegraph report was “damning” – telling Sky News:
What it shows is that while in public the SNP are saying they don’t want to see a Conservative government, in private they are actually saying they do want a Conservative government.
TV debate
Sturgeon was judged to have done very well in Thursday night’s 7-way TV debate, in which Cameron, Miliband and UKIP leader Nigel Farage also participated, with The Independent noting:
The SNP leader was largely unknown to most non-Scottish voters before the showdown on ITV – a panel of voters failed to identify Ms Sturgeon from her picture prior to the debate – but this morning, her name was the most Googled term in the whole of the UK.
Includes reporting from AFP.
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