Anas Sarwar has accused the SNP of hypocrisy for defending the Health Secretary after he was chauffeured to see his team play at Hampden four times. The Scottish Labour leader said the party wanted to attack Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer “day after day” for accepting freebies but “now find themselves in a very similar position”.
SNP Health Secretary Neil Gray has been under fire for using a ministerial car to attend several football matches.
During his statement to the Parliament on Thursday, Gray admitted he attended six games for free, two of which were to see Scotland and four were to watch Aberdeen. The Dons fan apologised during his speech for not going to a “wider range” of football matches.
He said this gave the impression he was acting “more as a fan and less as a minister”. Asked about his apology on Friday, the Scottish Labour leader said: “I think the public can see and understand that it’s probably not a mere coincidence.”
Sarwar, who was in Maryhill in Glasgow campaigning for his party, claimed the SNP had one standard for themselves and another for everyone else.
He said: “I think it exposes the hypocrisy of the SNP who wanted to spend day after day, week after week, attacking the Labour Party for engaging in what they call engagements and making an issue around football tickets, etc, and they now find themselves in a very similar position. It’s the hypocrisy of it where they expect one standard for everybody else but actually a different standard for themselves.”
Sarwar said he was “perfectly relaxed” about politicians attending sports and cultural events, adding that “it’s important they do”. “What they have to be is transparent,” he said. “They have to make a judgment call about what public resources are used or not used.”
Sarwar, who was given free tickets to watch Liverpool FC with Scottish Secretary Ian Murray in September, joined the Tories in calling for the Scottish Government to publish more details on why Gray attended the matches.
He said: “Neil Gray himself has admitted that perhaps he got the balance wrong in terms of focusing primarily on Aberdeen football games given he’s an Aberdeen fan. What I’m not sure about is he seemed to suggest that the problem was he should have gone to even more games rather than choosing the appropriate games if he was genuinely on Government business.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Mr Gray has made a statement to Parliament on this issue. The question raised by Rachael Hamilton was answered by the First Minister yesterday.”
The Scottish Government has been approached for comment about Sarwar’s remarks.
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