{"id":32245,"date":"2023-05-03T11:27:46","date_gmt":"2023-05-03T11:27:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/scottish-national-party-appoints\/"},"modified":"2023-05-03T11:29:17","modified_gmt":"2023-05-03T11:29:17","slug":"scottish-national-party-appoints","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/scottish-national-party-appoints\/","title":{"rendered":"Scottish National Party appoints auditors as account deadline looms"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>LONDON (Reuters) &#8211;     The Scottish National Party (SNP) on Wednesday said it had appointed auditors ahead of a July deadline to file its annual accounts with Britain&#8217;s electoral body as police continue to probe the party&#8217;s finances.<\/p>\n<p>The husband of former Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon was held by police last month as part of an investigation into the funding of the pro-independence SNP, which runs Scotland&#8217;s semi-autonomous government, before being released without charge.<\/p>\n<p>The party&#8217;s treasurer has stepped back as police look into what happened to more than 600,000 pounds ($750,000) raised by Scottish independence campaigners in 2017, which was supposed to have been ring-fenced but may have been used for other purposes.<\/p>\n<p>After a months-long search, SNP leader Humza Yousaf said that the party had appointed AMS Accountants Group as auditors, following the resignation of the previous auditors last year.<\/p>\n<p>The party faces the prospect of a fine if it misses July deadline to file its 2022 accounts with the Electoral Commission.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is welcome news that AMS Accountants Group will complete the accounts for both the party and the SNP Westminster group,&#8221; Yousaf said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There is hard work ahead, but it is really encouraging to have them on board as we work towards challenging deadlines.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Yousaf became SNP leader and Scotland&#8217;s first minister in March, after Sturgeon&#8217;s surprise resignation.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p> (Reporting by Alistair Smout)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/scottish-national-party-appoints\/snp-leadership-hustings-in-aberdeen\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportWorldNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ420BY-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ420BY-VIEWIMAGE\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>LONDON (Reuters) &#8211; The Scottish National Party (SNP) on Wednesday said it had appointed auditors ahead of a July deadline to file its annual accounts with Britain&#8217;s electoral body as police continue to probe the party&#8217;s finances. The husband of former Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon was held by police last month as part of an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":32246,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1222],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-32245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-world-news","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportWorldNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ420BY-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32245"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32245\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32406,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32245\/revisions\/32406"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}