'The lady doth protest too much, methinks.'
William Shakespeare, Hamlet, c. 1600.

'You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!'
Oliver Cromwell, 20 th April 1653.

'Oh what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!'
Sir Walter Scott Bt., Marmion, 22 nd February 1808.

'You're so deceitful you can't ask for water when you're thirsty. We could tangle spiders in the webs you weave.'
Prince Richard in The Lion in Winter, 1968

The Borg Queen -" Seven of £999"

'Party observers hoped Mr Dewar would widen his circle once former Treasury Minister Helen Liddell joined his team as his "Nat-bashing" deputy. But insiders say Mrs Liddell is very much on the periphery of an inner circle which includes special adviser Wendy Alexander and her brother, MP Douglas Alexander, who is there at the Chancellor's behest.'
Catherine Macleod in the Herald, 30 th November 1998.

'Wendy Alexander, standing in Paisley North, is one of a group, now in their 30s, who 12 years ago formed Scottish Labour Action, a pressure group aimed at ensuring the party did not renege on its promise to deliver a parliament. About half a dozen of that group can expect to be elected, and some are almost certain to find themselves in Mr Dewar's first cabinet. The person eventually to replace Mr Dewar could come from that generation.'
Ewen MacAskill in the Guardian, 5 th May 1999.

'Rising politician Wendy Alexander was keeping firmly silent yesterday over claims she has been tipped as Donald Dewar's successor. She refused to comment on rumours that she was being groomed for Scotland's top political job, or on suggestions that Dewar sees her as a 'favoured daughter'.'
Brian Currie in the Daily Record, 29 th July 1999.

'Just imagine what that means: 120 jobs lost in a civilian community of just 600. Half the schoolchildren gone. The economic, social and cultural power of one-third of your fellow islanders ripped away. No other base has such a close relationship with the local community, as it is the main employer and there is such a small number of people on the island. The Holyrood minister Wendy Alexander found such an exercise of imagination beyond her. Wasn't this oil-rich Shetland, she shrugged to a deputation of Unst folk Help yourselves, she told them. Anyway, military stuff is Westminster's responsibility. The central belt is where the poor live...'
Tom Morton in the New Statesman, 18 th October 1999.

'The Falkirk East MP blames First Minister Donald Dewar and Communities Minister Wendy Alexander for botching the repeal. Connarty blamed the fiasco on Wendy Alexander, claiming: 'The level of hysteria over this has been appalling but, in a sense, Wendy asked for it'.'
Carlos Alba in the Daily Record, 14 th March 2000.

'Spotted in the executive lounge at Heathrow waiting for the shuttle were a senior Labour MP and his researcher. Huddled over their papers they were attracting attention with the odd guffaw. Could it have been another one of Wendy Alexander's policy papers they were reading?'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 16 th May 2000.

'Communities Minister Wendy Alexander was at the centre of a new storm last night after she was accused of misleading Parliament. And Cabinet colleagues are furious she has landed the Government in another political mess. One said: 'You would think she would have learned her lesson by now. She doesn't consult, she just bashes ahead in her own sweet way'.'
Dave King in the Daily Record, 18 th May 2000.

'Gruppenfuhrer Wendy Alexander wants to know every last detail of the make-up of management committees like the local mother and toddler groups.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 18 th May 2000.

'The prying eyes of Wendy Alexander have been shut by the Diary, which last week exposed Big Sister's nebbing into the sexuality of the guid folk of Craigmillar.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 26 th May 2000.

'One reveller recalls: 'I'll never forget looking out the window and the sight of Wendy trying to climb over the back wall with a carry-out so that she could sneak in'.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 25 th January 2001.

' Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Minister and MSP for Paisley North, Wendy's fast-talking ways have seen her described as 'a gerbil on amphetamines'.'
Donna White & Jean Rafferty in the Sunday Mail, 25 th March 2001.

'A formal complaint has been lodged with Scotland's most senior civil servant alleging a Scottish Cabinet minister has been 'interfering' with the running of a government department. Wendy Alexander, the Enterprise Minister, is said to have intimidated and ordered around members of her department. Senior civil servants said such actions amount to 'politicising' the press office. Andrew Baird, who ran the enterprise desk, complained he could no longer work with Miss Alexander and has been moved to another post.'
Nick Britten, Scottish Political Correspondent in the Telegraph, 30 th March 2001.

'After a series of alleged rows, Mr Baird, who is highly regarded within the Civil Service, said he could no longer work with Miss Alexander and was transferred to another department. Last night it emerged that Mr Baird had the support of his colleagues, many of whom are 'fed up' with Miss Alexander's interference and 'overbearing and over-demanding' nature.'
Nick Britten, Scottish Political Correspondent in the Telegraph, 30 th March 2001.

'This comes days after Wendy Alexander allegedly threw a tantrum when she was asked to take on the water brief after the resignation of Sam Galbraith as environment minister.'
BBC Scotland Chief Political Correspondent, John Morrison, 30 th March 2001.

'Enterprise Minister Wendy Alexander was under mounting pressure last night after she was accused of breaking strict government rules. Her government press officer quit last week complaining she had been 'interfering' with the running of the department and claiming he could no longer work with her. Andrew Baird - who is highly rated within the civil service - has since been moved to another post. He is the third press officer Wendy Alexander has lost in less than two years.'
Lorraine Davidson in the Mirror, 31 st March 2001

'One of the great political issues of our age, ie the last 15 minutes, is this: has Wendy Alexander spun out of control and can she be reined in again '
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 3 rd April 2001.

'Enterprise Minister Wendy Alexander had come under fire after the publicity disaster of the announcement.'
Daily Record, 21 st April 2001.

'It's a snakepit up there, with a good chance now that two of the mostly hotly-favoured female faces of the new regime, Wendy Alexander and Susan Deacon, may pack the whole thing in after just one term of office.'
Sunday Business, 29 th April 2001.

'In March this year Mr McLeish was accused of having a lack of control after reports that Enterprise Minister, Wendy Alexander, 'threw a tantrum' when she was ordered to take responsibility for water authorities in the wake of Environment Minister Sam Galbraith's resignation.'
Deirdre Kelly on BBC News Online, 8 th November 2001.

'Gordon seemed to be in a bad mood and didn't even say good morning, and I found out later in the day why. John Reid rang me to tell me that Wendy Alexander had been forced to pull out of the race for Scottish first minister, because of lack of support and because the unions refused to back her, even though Gordon had tried to get them to override the one-member-one-vote ballot and just nominate her.'
From David Blunket's dairies, 11 th November 2001.

'Far be it for us to suggest anyone is two sandwiches short of a picnic, but Wendy Alexander has a thing about biscuits.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 15 th November 2001.

'The $64,000 question, of course, is whether Wendy Alexander at transport - now easily her main priority - will accept the new deal. She has been severely humiliated and it remains to be seen whether she will swallow one more bitter pill, in the shape of Mr Kerr's overview of her department.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 28 th November 2001.

'Reports of a row between the then First Minister Henry McLeish and Enterprise Minister Wendy Alexander over the timing of his appointment also added to the controversy.'
BBC Scotland News, 27 th December 2001.

'But there is another Alexander. The Alexander whose senior officials would refuse to go the extra mile for her because they knew that success would bring little praise, and failure would bring blame and complaints to the Permanent Secretary. The Alexander for whom a string of senior and experienced civil service press officers refused to work because of her constant, and often unreasonable, demands. The Alexander who defied a First Minister's wishes and forced him into a position where he lied for her. And the Alexander who, with just a mobile phone, once managed to bring most of the British political system to a grinding halt.'
Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 26 th January 2002.

'It was then that British politics almost ground to a halt as Alexander, already under a massive strain because she had been put in charge of Labour's Scottish general election campaign by Gordon Brown, telephoned everyone she knew to protest. From Downing Street staffers to a bemused Galbraith to Pat McFadden, a long-time No 10 adviser who was at the time working for the party, they all got frantic calls from a wound-up Alexander, who launched into a diatribe against the First Minister.'
Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 26 th January 2002.

'Alexander also made a number of further calls to McLeish himself to vent her fury. Executive colleagues who were close to the process at the time told me later that she claimed to have rung Brown at the Treasury and was citing his name in her case against the First Minster. Some believe that Brown never received a call, but that Alexander was using his influence with the First Minister as a lever to get her own way. It is no exaggeration to say that most of the Scottish executive and a significant part of Whitehall ground to a halt that night. Alexander wreaked havoc via the mobile phone, complaining vociferously that she just could not manage and that she had not agreed with the First Minister to do the job.'
Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 26 th January 2002.

'I did a lot for Henry McLeish because I liked him and believed he was pursuing the right policies for Scotland. But I was not going to get into a position where I was lying for him. Or for Wendy Alexander.'
Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 26 th January 2002.

'Former First Minister Henry McLeish lied to the media in order to cover up a ministerial row, according to his former aide. Peter MacMahon said Mr McLeish had 'committed the cardinal sin' when asked about an alleged argument with Enterprise Minister Wendy Alexander. Writing in the Scotsman newspaper about his role as special adviser to the former first minister, Mr MacMahon said Ms Alexander was viewed as 'exceptional but with a fierce temper.'
BBC Scotland News, 26 th January 2002.

'The Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Minister Wendy Alexander has resigned from the Scottish Cabinet. The First Minister, Jack McConnell, has accepted her resignation but in a letter to Ms Alexander expressed his regret at her departure. Ms Alexander, 38, had considered standing for the first minister's post after the resignation of Henry McLeish last November, but stood aside when Mr McConnell ran for the office.'
BBC Scotland News, 3 rd May 2002.

'Wendy Alexander quit front line politics amid claims that she was driven from her position as Enterprise Minister by Jack McConnell, the First Minister.'
Tom Peterkin in the Telegraph, 4 th May 2002.

'Seven hundred workers lost their jobs yesterday - as the number of Scots firms going bust hit record levels. The redundancies at Grampian Country Foods and plastics firm Rosti Ltd - coupled with the shock figures on company failures - plunged new Enterprise Minister Iain Gray into his first crisis, just four days into the job. And it sparked a bitter backlash against his predecessor Wendy Alexander, who was accused of knowing bad news was in the offing and 'dropping him in it'.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 9 th May 2002.

'And there continued to be questions asked about Labour's direction following the resignation of Enterprise Minister Wendy Alexander. She smiled from the backbenches, like a Cheshire cat, on Wednesday as MSPs formally voted in the new members of First Minister Jack McConnell's team - Iain Gray at enterprise, Margaret Curran and Hugh Henry at the social justice department and Frank McAveety as a junior health minister.'
John Knox, BBC Scotland News, 10 th May 2002.

'It was our man on the spot at Radio Clyde who caught Wendy sighing into the microphone that she was the minister for so much that 'I cannot remember my own title'.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 26 th May 2002.

'The Scottish Sun newspaper has obtained copies of correspondence between Ms Alexander and former SNP deputy leader Jim Sillars which was written following her shock departure. In it the MSP said she believes almost a century has passed since Scotland's Labour Movement last made a 'real intellectual contribution' to the UK Labour Party.'
BBC Scotland News, 30 th September 2002.

'One act of political suicide usually ends a career. Wendy Alexander has now committed that act three times within just one year. Her political career is dead and buried. And earlier this week, when the details of her letter to Scottish nationalist Jim Sillars were revealed, we saw the monument to mark the grave.'
Paul Sinclair in the Daily Record, 2 nd October 2002.

'Miss Alexander is regarded as one of the brightest MSPs, but her resignation was accompanied by claims that she had been overburdened by Mr McConnell when she was in his Cabinet. The acrimony surrounding her departure increased when she wrote a letter to Jim Sillars, the leading nationalist, complaining that Labour in Scotland was bereft of ideas.'
Tom Peterkin in the Telegraph, 10 th February 2003.

'Although one of the brightest Labour MSPs in the parliament, Alexander is not popular. Her rapid speech, poor people skills, and lack of patience with those who cannot follow her logic make her appear patronising, with one journalist describing her as sounding 'like a gerbil on amphetamine'.'
Scottish Politics April 2003.

'Wendy was difficult to deal with.'
Former Labour First Minister the Rt Hon Henry McLeish in Scotland First, Mainstream Publishing, 2004.

'I and a number of other Scottish Cabinet colleagues were surprised when the abolition of Section 28 was announced as a priority of the Scottish Executive by our colleague Wendy Alexander during a speech at Glasgow University.'
Former Labour First Minister the Rt Hon Henry McLeish in Scotland First, Mainstream Publishing, 2004.

'Former enterprise minister Wendy Alexander was shouted down by MSPs after telling parliament that Scotland's economy was on the up.'
BBC Scotland News, 12 th February 2004.

'Did you read it It would have brought a tear to a glass eye. Wee Douglas Alexander huffing and puffing that the big nasty media was really horrible to his extremely talented sister Wendy. Wee Wendy Alexander as the victim? That's a new one mate. Anyone who has any doubts about why Ms Alexander has been consigned to the dustbin of political history should ask any of her civil servants. Oh they loved her. All of that foot stamping and thcweaming goes down really well.'
Ron Mackenna in the Mirror, 16 th April 2004.

'Wendy Alexander's entry on the Parliament's website but found there was not a mention of her ministerial career. Stalinism is alive and well.'
Simon Pia (who was appointed as Wendy Alexander's spin doctor on the 18 th February 2008) in the Scotsman, 1 st September 2004.

'Former enterprise minister Wendy Alexander yesterday slammed the Executive's efficiency drive amid claims it could have saved an extra pounds 400million if it had been as stringent as England and Wales.'
Daily Record, 11 th May 2005.

'In the committee rooms there was an astonishing attack on Finance Minister Tom McCabe by his former colleague Wendy Alexander.'
John Knox, BBC Scotland News, 13 th May 2005.

'One of the more notable claims was by Wendy Alexander, a Labour backbench MSP for Paisley North and a former Scottish Executive minister. She defended a £15,600 claim for office supplies by saying: 'The postage and stationery spending reflects the exceptionally hard work of the office in keeping constituents up to date with local developments particularly around campaigns on antisocial behaviour in Paisley and the future of local health services in Argyll and Clyde'.'
Angus Macleod in the Times, 14 th December 2005.

'You know politics is a funny old game. If there was one thing you could have been sure of it was that Wendy Alexander's political career was over. Dead as a very dead dodo. It wasn't simply her botched attempt to become First Minister. And it was botched big style. It was the fact that she and First Minister Jack McConnell did not get on. And Jack made his feelings abundantly clear on that. That and the fact he simply didn't rate her.'
Ron Mackenna in the Mirror, 24 th November 2006.

'There is more to Wendy Alexander than brains. Politics runs in the family. Brother Douglas is Transport Secretary and Scottish Secretary too. When she was young she was a researcher for the Scottish Labour Party. When she was very young she worked for George Galloway, though she does not boast about that now.'
Peter MacMahon in the Scotsman, 19 th May 2007.

'Some members may recall that I refrained yesterday from commenting on the scope of Mr Swinney's portfolio. However, as today's debate is on the approach to government and this is our only chance to discuss a decision that is not subject to the discussion and persuasion that Mr Swinney has just promised but which, in fact, has already been taken, I might dwell for a moment on this leviathan department, which at least deserves a mention from the Labour benches, if not from the Government ones. Last night, I was reading a bedtime story to my children. It happened to be 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar', which some members will know: 'On Saturday he ate through one piece of chocolate cake, one ice-cream cone, one pickle, one slice of Swiss cheese, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake, and one slice of watermelon.' I was, of course, put in mind of John Swinney's portfolio. On Wednesday, he ate through one statement on post offices, one on bridge tolls, one debate on the approach to government, one debate on welfare and fairness, one debate on transport, one statement on energy policy and one set of questions and 'That night he had a stomach ache' - or at least a headache, because that is the parliamentary business for this week and next week that falls within Mr Swinney's portfolio. One of the delicious ironies of the speech that we have just heard, which was sincerely devoted to the cause of slimmer government, is that its delivery has been entrusted to a department that is so super sized that it has already devoured most of the statements announced for the chamber and three of the four debates scheduled so far. I suggest tactfully to Mr Swinney that he consider putting his own sprawling department on a diet of parliamentary time, if only to allow one of his Cabinet colleagues to get a look in.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 24 th May 2007.

'I don't know about the hungry caterpillar, but I think I know one politician who isn't going to turn into a magnificent butterfly in the near future. Labour's new finance (etc) spokesperson, Wendy Alexander, didn't do much to further her ambition to replace Jack McConnell as leader with her first front-bench outing last week. Her speech comparing the SNP's John Swinney to the eponymous caterpillar in the children's story - on the grounds that he is gobbling up Cabinet portfolios - was an embarrassing mess. Was this the finest intellect in the Labour firmament?'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 27 th May 2007.

'I thought that after the hungry caterpillar escapade Wendy Alexander might have learned something about how to approach parliamentary statements, but her approach on this occasion has been no better than it was then.'
Cabinet Secretary for Finance & Sustainable Growth, John Swinney MSP, 28 th June 2007.

'A 5lb bag of potatoes has emerged as the early favourite to be the next leader of the Scottish Labour Party, as speculation mounts that Jack McConnell may stand down within weeks.'
The Daily Mash, June 2007.'

'Wendy Alexander: A very bad political operator who was seen as an unsafe bag of vegetables at the enterprise department. The Paisley North MSP has tried to soften her image in recent years but many still doubt whether she is a human being. Her 'Hungry Caterpillar' speech last month was judged to be the worst moment in the history of Western Europe. Will have the support of teenage brother Douglas and fellow pod-creature Gordon Brown.'
The Daily Mash, June 2007.

'The future almost certainly belongs to Wendy Alexander, the favourite to win the Labour leadership contest. She is, of course, sister of Douglas Alexander, one of Gordon Brown's closest friends and the architect of Labour's failed Scottish campaign. She is therefore handicapped, and also has an abrasive personality and an unfortunate tendency to let her mouth run away with her.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 29 th July 2007.

'Ms Alexander criticised the Scottish Executive's management of its social justice policy and its efficiency savings drive and eventually became convener of the Scottish Parliament's powerful finance committee. A row also erupted over a leaked letter she wrote to former SNP deputy leader Jim Sillars, in which she said that perhaps the last time the Labour movement in Scotland had made 'a real intellectual contribution' to the party nationally was in 1906.'
Andrew Black, BBC Scotland News, 15 th August 2007.

'Can Ms Alexander reform and revitalise Labour in Scotland while reinventing herself as a formidable alternative to the polished performer that Alex Salmond is turning out to be as First Minister?'
Herald Editorial, 16 th August 2007.

'Although highly respected as a policy-maker and strategist, her political experience at Holyrood has not been entirely happy, culminating in her sudden resignation from Jack McConnell's cabinet after only five months as 'minister for everything'.'
Herald Editorial, 16 th August 2007.

'She has her critics in the Scottish party - mostly, it has to be said, people who are too scared of her to speak of their reservations to her face. Some believe she is not grounded enough and does not have the common touch needed to be a Labour leader. But all that is yet to be tested and what is in Ms Alexander's favour is that she is not expected to do well against Mr Salmond at First Minister's questions. This puts her at a considerable advantage. Every good performance will be unexpected as she does not have high expectations to meet.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 16 th August 2007.

'She emerged with the result she wanted, but with doubts about her political judgement. That period as a minister also raised questions about her ability to communicate with voters and to take people with her.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 16 th August 2007.

'Can Alexander turn things around Even if she faces no leadership challenge, she still has to convince her party and Scotland that she is the right person for the job. Her decision not to stand against Jack McConnell in 2001 and her resignation from his cabinet raised question marks. Then there are the fabled 'Wendyisms' - a percieved brusqueness with some colleagues and a tendency to deliver 100 minute lectures.'
Scotland on Sunday Editorial, 19 th August 2007.

'If Wendy Alexander is the solution to Scottish Labour's problems, then all the party is going to end up with is two problems. Her leadership could well mean division and further defeat.'
Former Labour Cllr, Gordon Archer in Scotland on Sunday, 19 th August 2007.

'Labour's new Scottish leader is famously bad at making connections with people, adopts a rather patrician air and has a tendency towards huffiness if things don't go her way. The question of whether Alexander has the skills required to lead and manage the egos and agendas involved is one being glossed over by her supporters.'
Former Labour Cllr, Gordon Archer in Scotland on Sunday, 19 th August 2007.

'The scale of the challenge facing Wendy Alexander, favourite to replace Jack McConnell as leader of the Scottish Labour party, is revealed in a YouGov poll which shows that only 7% of voters would like to see her as first minister. According to the survey, she is considerably less popular than Alex Salmond, the first minister, who has an approval rating of 38%. She also trails behind McConnell, who is at 10%, and she is level with Annabel Goldie, the Scottish Tory leader. Only Nicol Stephen, leader of the Liberal Democrats, is more unpopular, with only 5% saying they would like to see him running the country.'
Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 19 th August 2007.

'Wendy Alexander was crucial to my victory over the late Roy Jenkins in Glasgow Hillhead more than 20 years ago. Though still a student, she took charge of my election HQ, proving a brilliant organiser and motivator, and even found time to baby sit my five-year-old daughter. I appointed her my first parliamentary researcher. She's clever and a decent soul. But she can be otherworldly to the point that she is life, Jim, but not as we know it. Long after mobile phones were proliferating across the land, I saw her lovingly handling one belonging to the brother of one of her own MSPs. 'That's amazing,' said the would-be First Minister. 'But where do you put the money in '.'
George Galloway in the Daily Record, 20 th August 2007.

'Brown may be bouncing but Wendy is wobbling.'
Lesley Riddoch in the Guardian, 20 th August 2007.

'To reinvigorate the Scottish Labour Party, Ms Alexander has to win back the Scots who have deserted Labour - some have headed towards the SNP, some to the Liberal Democrats and some to apathy and disillusionment with politics in general. Labour Party membership in Scotland is down 30 per cent since 2000, dropping from 26,500 to 18,500 in seven years. At the same time, SNP membership has risen: in 2003, the Nationalists had 9,450 members, but today the party has 13,585 - a rise of 44 per cent in four and a half years. At the elections in May this year, Scottish Labour lost 161 councillors, while the SNP doubled its number of councillors from 181 to 363. Much of this was down to the new transferable-vote system, but it still means many more SNP activists on the ground and far fewer Labour ones. In 1999, Scottish Labour had 56 MSPs and 56 MPs; now they have 46 MSPs and 40 MPs - again partly due to other factors including boundary changes. But the big impact of Labour's defeat in May this year was the loss of the Civil Service back-up which the party had started to take for granted. Now the party has to employ researchers to draft policies and construct arguments, jobs which used to be done by civil servants for the Labour Executive. So the party in Scotland has lost members, activists, councillors, MPs, MSPs, government support and, most important of all, voters. It is Ms Alexander's job to get them back.'
Hamish Macdonnell in the Scotsman, 21 st August, 2007.

'Wendy Alexander has been dealt an embarrassing blow in her first week as Scottish Labour leader after footage emerged of her husband making a case for independence. Professor Brian Ashcroft, policy director of the pro-Union economic think-tank, the Fraser of Allander Institute, was filmed arguing that Scotland would be more prosperous as a separate country than having full tax-raising powers as part of the UK.'
Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 26 th August 2007.

'On the day Wendy Alexander was crowned leader of the Scottish Labour Party, she became embroiled in a row over 'fat cats' being appointed to advise the party.'
Douglas Fraser in the Sunday Herald, 15 th September 2007.

'Wendy Alexander's honeymoon as Scottish Labour leader has ended abruptly after one of her senior MSPs described her new spin doctor as an 'idiot'. Lord Foulkes, a Labour member for Lothians, has made a complaint about the party's head of communications, Brian Lironi, for allegedly briefing against him. The MSP also slammed former Labour first minister Henry McLeish, who has criticised his party in recent weeks, by describing him as a 'strange guy' who should 'shut up'.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 16 th September 2007.

'Ms Alexander had mounted an able enough assault, but it's tricky when you try to storm a citadel armed with a damp squib.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 21 st September 2007.

'Wendy Alexander's first question time test as leader of the Scottish Labour Party ended in farce yesterday.'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 21 st September 2007.

'Wendy Alexander is facing her first crisis as Scottish Labour leader after several senior party figures expressed doubts about her leadership skills. A number of her MSPs believe they have been excluded from her team at the expense of a 'wee clique' of supporters.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 23 rd September 2007.

'Brian Lironi, the party's head of communications, is also likely to resign this week following clashes with the new leader and her allies. Her problems are set to continue after one of her new advisers, Mike Elrick, was revealed to have made a savage attack on what he described as the 'cynical and arrogant' Labour government.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 23 rd September 2007.

'Too many felt we had lost touch. The people of Scotland had not lost faith in Labour values but they wondered whether we had lost sight of how to put them into practice. And the Scottish National Party was the beneficiary of that disillusionment.'
Wendy Alexander to the UK Labour Conference, 24 th September 2007.

'Conference - we in Scotland need your help.'
Wendy Alexander to the UK Labour Conference, 24 th September 2007.

'We will be a party of principle and energy.'
Wendy Alexander to the UK Labour Conference, 24 th September 2007.

'She came to praise Jack McConnell. Then she buried him. Scottish Labour's new leader Wendy Alexander told her party's conference that her predecessor had many achievements but then tore into his legacy.'
Glen Campbell, Newsnight Scotland, 24 th September 2007.

'After a difficult first 10 days since being confirmed in the leadership, Labour moved to quash reports she has already driven a recently-hired media spokesman out of his job. Brian Lironi, who had been recruited as political journalist, announced yesterday he is quitting, only a month after he started work.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 25 th September 2008.

'Ms Alexander is never knowingly penitent, save when apologising for Jack McConnell's mistakes.'
Ian Bruce in the Herald, 28 th September 2008.

'Wendy Alexander can't do her job properly because she doesn't have enough money.'
BBC Scotland News, 3 rd October 2007.

'What has been Wendy Alexander's priority in the three weeks as opposition leader It hasn't been for more money for schools, or hospitals, or the police. It has been for more money for the opposition leader.'
First Minister, the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MSP MP, 4 th October 2007.

'It's one thing letting people down in government, Wendy Alexander is letting them down in opposition.'
First Minister, the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MSP MP, 4 th October 2007.

'Wendy Alexander is under pressure to reveal the identity of backers who helped fund her campaign to win leadership of the Labour Party in Scotland. Every donation to Alexander's campaign was under the £1000 limit that would trigger identification of the donor. She received a number of payments of £995; £5 more and such donations would have had to be reported to the Electoral Commission.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 17 th November 2007.

'A top Labour Party spokesman has been forced to resign after making a series of blunders at an awards ceremony. Matthew Marr is believed to have called First Minister Alex Salmond a four-letter word at the Scottish Politician of the Year dinner. It is also understood he was rude to a female nationalist MSP and abusive towards a cloakroom supervisor at the event on Thursday.'
BBC News, 18 th November 2007.

'Matthew Marr became the second Scottish Labour spin doctor to quit in the past few weeks, after he got drunk and became abusive at last week's Politician of the Year Awards.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 19 th November 2007.

'Scottish Labour's new spin-doctor made a series of damning criticisms of his colleagues weeks before he accepted the job as the party's head of communications. Gavin Yates used his blog to describe Wendy Alexander as 'abrasive' , labelled shadow health minister Andy Kerr as 'simply uninspiring', and blasted Jack McConnell for being a 'lame duck leader' when in office.
He also said the fledgling SNP government had a 'long and impressive' list of achievements, while describing first minister Alex Salmond as 'a great example of a politician on top of his game'.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 24 th November 2007.

'Wendy Alexander last night became enmeshed in Labour's donations sleaze row after an investigation by The Herald uncovered the identity of a tax exile who secretly helped fund her leadership campaign. She was forced to admit she had received money earlier this year from multi-millionaire Paul Green, a 65-year-old retail developer behind some of Scotland's highest-profile shopping centres.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 29 th November 2007.

'She is a woman famed for her mastery of detail but not the details about whether money given to her campaign is legal or not. First we were told the disputed donation was fine - then perhaps not - and then it was dodgy after all.'
STV News, 29 th November 2007.

'Jackie Baillie got herself so worked up trying to retrieve the situation later that the Presiding Officer turned her microphone off. It was a telling illustration of just how rattled Labour is at present.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 29 th November 2007.

'There has been sleaze in London, and that sleaze is now in Edinburgh too. Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander accepted an illegal donation for her leadership campaign. Cue a resignation - not Ms Alexander's but the man who asked for the money on her behalf.'
STV News, 29 th November 2007.

'The Tory crescendo came when their leader insisted Gordy was simply not up to the job. Speaker Michael Martin shouted above the tumult that the PM 'must get a hearing', to which one Conservative wag added: 'In court'.'
Michael Settle in the Herald, 29 th November 2007.

'The Scottish Labour Party was in turmoil last night after admitting it had broken the law over a dodgy donation to Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign.'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 30 th November 2007.

'I am very angry after innocently becoming embroiled in a national controversy. It has damaged the Labour Party that I support in Scotland and it was all so unnecessary if the party had only applied the rules. I cannot understand why they continued to maintain that the donation had come through a UK company when I had a letter from Wendy Alexander thanking me personally.'
Businessman Paul Green, 30 th November 2007.

'That Wendy Alexander should resign as leader of Labour in Scotland, there is no doubt. She either goes at once or she drags this farce out a while longer as she and her party try to come up with more lame excuses for a whole series of blunders.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 30 th November 2007.

'Over at that new daily must-read The Three Line Whip, Iain Martin has news of a letter that puts Wendy Alexander in a very difficult position. Alexander wrote to Paul Green, who as a tax exile is not entitled to make political contributions, to thank him for donating to her campaign. Wendy, sister of Douglas and protégé of Gordon, is now hanging onto her job by a thread.'
James Forsyth in the Spectator, 30 th November 2007.

'In her short time in the job, Scottish leader Wendy Alexander has lost two aides and now her transport spokesman, been involved in accepting an illegal donation, and faces the possibility of a criminal investigation.'
BBC News, 1 st December 2007.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander could be jailed if she is found guilty over dodgy donations, it has been revealed. Electoral law says anyone given an illegal gift must return it within 30 days or face up to a year in jail.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 1 st December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander's leadership of the Labour Party in Scotland looked increasingly untenable last night following further damning revelations about illegal donations.'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 30 th November 2007.

'I am an SNP supporter so I expect very little from the Labour Parody, but those who give their heart and soul to the party are being abused by their own leadership. Most Labour members and voters have the same passion for Scotland as do SNP supporters or LibDem, Green, SSP or even Conservative supporters. We may disagree on the issues or the methods but our love of country is the same.
I would be personally affronted if SNP MSPs were caught in such a pack of lies. I would have no pity for them and I would demand their resignation equally as fervently as I demand that of Alexander, McCabe, Gordon and Whitton.
In fact, if it involved the party leader I would be more incensed and heartbroken. I place party leaders in higher regard and impose upon them a higher standard.
Wendy Alexander must realize that she has broken not only the bond of trust necessary for any MSP but she has severely harmed the reputation of her party, all her colleagues in Holyrood and in local councls and most importantly, she has failed the party membership.
To retain personal power, without honour, is a stain that not be removed and will harm the party, the people and the nation.
Do the RIGHT THING, the lot of you, RESIGN NOW!'
Doonhamer in the Herald, 1 st December 2007.

'Of course I want you to stay but you must do what is best for your family.'
Gordon Brown to Wendy Alexander, 2 nd December 2007 (reported in the Times).

'No person has a good enough memory to make them a successful liar. This piece of wisdom from one of America's greatest politicians, Abraham Lincoln, seems to be being tested to destruction as Labour's fundraising methods are exposed.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 2 nd December 2007.

'It simply beggars belief. She's been caught with her hands in the sweetie jar and her mouth smeared with chocolate and still she says she is innocent!
She's a liar and a crook.
In brief, she's a Labour politician.'
Christina de Kéroualle in Scotland on Sunday, 2 nd December 2007.

'Alexander is also facing investigation after it appeared that she, too, breached electoral law. As a 'regulated donee' in her campaign, she is required by law to return any illegal donation within 30 days. This time period has elapsed.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd December 2007.

'Alexander's team is facing damaging charges that its members knew her campaign donation from tax exile Paul Green was suspect three weeks ago. According to her secret list of donors, of which the Sunday Herald has a hard copy, Green's cash was flagged up as being questionable as early as November 5. The document was created on a computer registered to 'Brian Ashcroft', Alexander's husband.
This contradicts the claim made by Tom McCabe - Alexander's campaign manager - that she was made aware of a personal, rather than corporate, donation from Green last Thursday.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd December 2007.

'As well as an Electoral Commission probe, Alexander could face a police inquiry after her team admitted to flouting the law. Pundits and MSPs are questioning whether the daily drip of revelations will make her Labour's shortest-serving leader.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander is at the centre of another funding row after it emerged that the name of a prominent businessman listed as a donor was different to the name her campaign team intended to give to the Electoral Commission.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd December 2007.

'I reject any suggestion of intentional wrongdoing on my part.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 2 nd December 2007.

'Clearly she has to explain how this came about and what she knew at the time.'
The Rt Hon Geoff Hoon MP, Labour Chief Whip at Westminster, 2 nd December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander has broken the law!'
BBC Scotland's Political Editor, Brian Taylor, on the Politics Show, 2 nd December 2007.

'Ms Alexander's position was looking increasingly fragile as the police were called in and as new documents emerged that raised further, serious questions over her involvement in Mr Green's donation. Her problems were compounded when Geoff Hoon, the Labour chief whip at Westminster, called publicly for her to explain what had happened and backed calls for the police to be involved.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 3 rd December 2007.

'Two police forces and the Electoral Commission have launched official inquiries after Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader in Scotland, admitted breaking the law by accepting the money for her leadership campaign.'
London Evening Standard, 3 rd December 2007.

The accused: Alexander is facing up to a year in prison.

'What a desperate situation: was no-one in the Labour Party prepared to step up to the plate and defend their own leader Labour appeared to be in denial, unwilling or unable to face up to the enormity of the situation. This isn't any old law we are talking about, but one of Labour's own flagship statutes: the Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. This makes clear that any attempt to conceal the identity of a political donor is against the law, as is acceptance of a donation from anyone who is not on the electoral register.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 3 rd December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander has refused to resign over an illegal donation to her leadership campaign.'
BBC News, 3 rd December 2007.

'I cannot think of any historical precedent of a party leader admitting to law-breaking and yet remaining in post. Tony Blair never conceded anything illegal in the cash-for-honours inquiry, and that was bad enough. But it has always been assumed in British public life that if someone actually admits to acting illegally, they simply have to resign.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 3 rd December 2007.

'Can Labour participate in the process of making laws in Holyrood when its leader, and half the shadow cabinet, have admitted to breaking the law?'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 3 rd December 2007.

'There is no reason why Wendy Alexander can't come clean and provide a full and comprehensive explanation of how she came to break the law by accepting an illegal campaign donation. Her continued failure to do so is yet another reason why her position looks to be untenable. The longer the silence goes on, the more her credibility drains away.'
Roseanna Cunningham MSP (Scottish National Party), 3 rd December 2007.

'Jesus Christ! Give me a break will you?'
Charles Gordon MSP (Labour, Glasgow Cathcart), 3 rd December 2007.

'Asked to clarify whether Wendy Alexander had offered to resign over the weekend, the Prime Minister's Spokesman (PMS) replied that it was not for him to answer questions on Wendy Alexander as she had no Government position, she was a Labour Party officer.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 3 rd December 2007.

'Normally, when people face the danger - and I presume she does face the danger here of a criminal prosecution - then normally you step aside from your position so you can concentrate on clearing your name.'
Sir Alistair Graham, former chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, 3 rd December 2007.

'Lord Maxton, a Labour peer, wrote to the chief of Strathclyde Police to complain about a document released to a newspaper which revealed he had also contributed to Miss Alexander's campaign. He accused the newspaper of breaking electoral law by releasing his name but the commission said there was no law against revealing donors.'
Kate Devlin in the Telegraph, 4 th December 2007.

'One Labour MSP contacted by The Herald expressed dismay at the way Ms Alexander and her advisers, who include senior figures such as Tom McCabe and David Whitton, were dealing with the controversy and said it was time for the Labour leader to stand down to prevent further damage to the party.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 4 th December 2007.

'Incidentally, the political blog, Mr Smith Goes to Holyrood (no relation), points out that if you click on 'Donate' on Wendy's website it states under terms and conditions: 'In compliance with party funding laws, if I am donating more than £200, I understand that my details will be checked to ensure I am registered on a UK electoral register.'
Ah, if only she'd read her own website.'
Ken Smith in the Herald, 4 th December 2007.

'The bottom line is that, even if she survives these next two or three difficult weeks, Ms Alexander may find it impossible to shrug off the effects of this scandal. She is desperate not to be taken down as a 'disgraced former Labour leader'. She does not want that to be her political epitaph. But avoiding it may be an impossible feat.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 4 th December 2007.

'An awful lot of politics is about perception and, right now, the perception is that Ms Alexander is damaged goods, that Labour is up to its neck in dodgy donations and that none of them can be trusted.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 4 th December 2007.

The letter: Alexander wrote to a Jersey based businessman to thank him for his donation.

'Miss Alexander says she was 'honoured and priviledged to lead the Labour Party'.
With her inability to spell the word 'privileged', all I can say is that I am glad Miss Alexander is not in charge of Scotland's education system.'
Liz Rosser in the Courier, 4 th December 2007.

'Despite what Ms Alexander and the Labour Party think, there is not one rule for them and one for us.'
Sandra Scott in the Daily Record, 4 th December 2007.

'How the Labour party managed to get themselves in this mess is something I find difficult to understand.'
Businessman Paul Green on BBC Radio Scotland, 4 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander looks set to face a police inquiry and when her role as human shield for Gordon Brown is over and the London media has moved on to political pastures anew, it's hard to see how the Scottish leader will survive.'
Lesley Riddoch in the Guardian, 4 th December 2007.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander has again refused to resign over the illegal donation which was accepted by her leadership campaign team.'
BBC News, 4 th December 2007.

'Labour MSPs today pledged support to their beleaguered leader Wendy Alexander as the businessman at the centre of the dodgy donations row accused her campaign team of 'gross mismanagement'.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 4 th December 2007.

'So that's why they are so often refered to as the West of Scotland Labour mafia - they support criminals.'
Iain Morrison in the Evening News, 4 th December 2007.

'It's another irregular verb:
I made an adminstrative error;
You acted within the spirit of the law;
He accepted an illegal donation contrary to the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000.
.....Apologies to Bernard Woolley for nicking that one :)'
Chris. J. in the Evening News, 4 th December 2007.

'Asked if the Prime Minister retained full confidence in Peter Hain and Harriet Harman, the PMS said the Prime Minister retained full confidence in both. Asked if the Prime Minister retained confidence in Wendy Alexander, the PMS replied that she was not a member of the Government, so therefore it was not for him to comment on her position.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 4 th December 2007.

'Too many teeter on the threshold of concluding that they are morally entitled to blur the rules, while one or two have already crossed the line. Douglas Alexander's injunction to his sister not to stand down because it would harm Harman and Brown has the authentic smack of mafia family morality about it.'
Martin Kettle in the Guardian, 4 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander, the sister of International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander, is under intense pressure to step down after accepting an illegal £950 donation to her leadership campaign. Gordon. She nearly quit at the weekend until her brother and Mr Brown pressed her to stay. She was told that if she went, it would be difficult for Ms Harman - who accepted a £5,000 illegal donation - not to follow her example.'
Daily Mail, 5 th November 2007.

'I see that The Electoral Commission is a UK body - and a certain Lord Elder (Lord Murray Elder of Kirkcaldy) is listed as a member of the Electoral Commission's Parliamentary Advisory Group. As well as being a former colleage of Wendy Alexander he was also a secret donor to her campaign fund according to the list that was obtained by Paul Hutcheon of The Sunday Herald.'
Neil Robertson in the Herald, 5 th December 2007.

'Why do politicians seem to think to think that owning up to mistakes and promising that 'lessons have been learned,' somehow makes it alright At the end of the day, they may escape prosecution. Ms Alexander makes great play of her confidence that she will be 'exonerated of any intentional wrongdoing. But even if only the spirit of the law has been broken, politicians are responsible for the actions of their campaign teams. Joe Public wouldn't get away with it and neither should they. After all, there is no defence of ignorance when hauled before a JP for breaking the speed limit.'
Graham Dines in the East Anglian Daily Times, 5 th December 2007.

'Our coarsened nation is thus matched with coarsened politicians. The few who are not stand out like beacons, and we revere them. The rest are grasping, expensive for the state to run, achieve little, and are rewarded chronically for failure. They have little idea how to behave, are incapable of acting decently when found out in doing wrong, and see no harm in consorting with the most shocking people. That is where professionalisation has got us: politics is no longer a fit calling for a respectable young or middle-aged person. And as we survey this swamp of oily people on the make, whatever can it portend for our democracy?'
Simon Heffer in the Telegraph, 5 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander's bold assertion that she had not knowingly broken the law comes despite the fact that she wrote a personal letter of thanks to Mr Green at his address on Jersey on October 5.'
Press & Journal, 5 th December 2007.

'Navraj Ghaleigh, quoted by the BBC as an 'Edinburgh University public law lecturer', claims Wendy Alexander may not be liable for acepting an illegal donation. Mr Ghaleigh was the Labour candidate for Edinburgh West at the 2005 Westminster Election.'
Scottish Politics, 5 th December 2007.

'Throughout this week, Ms Alexander has been forced to fend off calls for her resignation following news that the Scottish Labour Party took an illegal donation from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green.'
BBC News, 6 th December 2007.

'The Electoral Commission was last night beginning its inquiry in to Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign donations after the Labour chief confirmed details had been passed to the watchdog.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 6 th December 2007.

'But it's not just Brown who could be damaged. Labour has lost power in Holyrood and now faces a slow descent into the same sleazy oblivion into which the once-dominant Scottish Tories disappeared in the mid 90s. This leaves the SNP as the dominant force in Scottish politics for the foreseeable future. Incredibly, the very future of the union has been placed in jeopardy over a donation of £950.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 6 th December 2007.

'The SNP has opened up an eleven-point gap over Labour in Scotland, the biggest Nationalist lead ever recorded over their rivals by a mainstream polling organisation.
The surge can only be explained by the performance of the Salmond government and the troubles of Wendy Alexander's Holyrood opposition.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 6 th December 2007.

'The people of Scotland are clearly deciding it's time to leave the small-minded, corrupt Labour mafia behind once and for all!'
Alex Brodie in in the Herald, 6 th December 2007.

'Labour before the election was adamant there was no need to revisit the devolution settlement. Yet now Ms Alexander has set out areas in which she believes that more powers could be devolved - in her lecture, she highlighted welfare, road transport, public holidays, marine issues and animal health.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 6 th December 2007.

'Does Wendy Alexander care - no she doesn't. Because it isn't really about moving anything forward except herself, preferably moving herself as far away from the rest of the news agenda as possible.'
Former SNP Deputy leader, Roseanna Cunnigham MSP, 6 th December 2007.

'I don't know what's wrong with the Nats. Maybe all this mature, governing-party stuff has gone to their heads. They had Labour and its leader for the taking yesterday and they fluffed their chance. They may well live to regret this missed opportunity. There is, of course, a view within SNP circles that they don't want Wendy Alexander to lose her job. They think she's doing so badly that she's their best hope of staying in power.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 7 th December 2007.

'Gifts and hospitality cannot always be refused for fear of giving offence.'
Charles Gordon MSP (Labour, Glasgow Cathcart), 7 th December 2007.

'A member of Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign team who admitted blunders over the acceptance of a £950 donation from a foreign businessman said today that he plans to stay on as an MSP. There had been speculation that Charlie Gordon, who quit as Labour's shadow transport minister last week, would stand down from the Scottish parliament and trigger a byelection.'
Haroon Siddique in the Guardian, 7 th December 2007.

'It is simply not credible for all of those involved in Wendy Alexander's campaign to claim innocence and keep their jobs,'
SNP MSP Sandra White, 7 th December 2007.

'Three things occur to me.
One, Charlie Gordon is plainly hurting.
Two, Glasgow City Council is plainly not the epitome of comradely fellowship one had always imagined it to be.
Three, this entire affair will remain unresolved until the Electoral Commission rules. Or the police intervene. Or both.'
BBC Scotland Political Editor Brian Taylor, 7 th December 2007.

'There's been an illegality which I understand has been admitted. There's some debate about who has prime responsibility for that.
In these circumstances then a police investigation at some point is inevitable as surely as night follows day.
At some point there has to be a police investigation - it cannot be dealt with in any other way.
In these circumstances, I find it difficult to see how Wendy Alexander staying in office during this investigation is tenable.'
First Minister of Scotland, the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MSP MP, 7 th December 2007.

'A defiant Charlie Gordon made clear last night that he would not be resigning as an MSP, dismissing breaches of the electoral law as no more than 'a fuss'.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 8 th December 2007.

'What Labour absolutely does not need just now is a by-election. The YouGov poll in recent days gives the SNP its biggest ever lead and a by-election would be a minefield for Labour.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 8 th December 2007.

'If any of those who were helping out on the campaign has committed a minor breach in this way, then we are sincerely sorry.'
'Jolly' Jackie Baillie MSP (Labour, Dumbarton), 8 th December 2007.

'What will the electorate make of all this Well it depends on what medium you garner your news from. If it is the BBC website then they could be forgiven for thinking that there hadn't been much of a scandal at all. For fully 36 hours following the revelations by The Sunday Herald the lead story on the Scottish section of the BBC web based news was a local government policy change by the SNP.'
GS, Coatbridge, in the Herald, 8 th December 2007.

'The Labour Party is becoming adept at getting into deep trouble but fails miserably when it comes to getting out of it again. The Scottish leader, Wendy Alexander, and several senior party figures in Westminster, cannot seem to shake off the taint of corruption surrounding donations they have received from business figures.'
Press & Journal Editorial, 8 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander seems happy to let herself be bruised by the opposition while waiting for the Electoral Commission, the police or anyone in authority to clear her of any wrongdoing. According to Labour, the evidence of her innocence or ignorance has been passed to the Electoral Commission. If it was in her possession, perhaps she should have shared it with us all?'
Press & Journal Editorial, 8 th December 2007.

'The secret list of donors that showed Wendy Alexander's team knew four weeks ago about a legally suspect donation from a Jersey tycoon was sent directly from the Labour leader's office. The Sunday Herald understands the list of fundraisers was circulated by her office using the parliamentary email system - a link that ties Alexander to the document. It also suggests the Labour leader's campaign was using MSP facilities for party fundraising purposes - an activity that is explicitly against Holyrood rules.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 9 th December 2007.

'All this mess because the Labour Party was worried about the SNP getting money from Sean Connery who lived abroad. So they thought that they would change the rules, which they did. Now it turns out that they cannot understand or abide by their own rules, and in opposition they have deprived themselves of more money, and Wendy is complaining that she doesn't have enough money to run her department.'
Richard Quinn in the Sunday Herald, 9 th December 2007.

'We now know chimps beat humans hands down when it comes to memory tests. So I'm wondering why the Labour Party didn't put apes in charge of handling donations. Our hairy relatives might not be potty trained, but I'm sure they wouldn't have left as much s*** around as the humans have.'
Anna Smith in the Sunday Mirror, 9 th December 2007.

'Up here in the cheap seats, we're even more paranoid about politicians trying to pull the wool over our eyes. After all, we have the proud history of our First Minister Henry McLeish having to quit over grubby money dealings. And we thought we'd seen the last of it until MSP Charles Gordon and a case of amnesia that would put canoeist John Darwin to shame. Gordon may well be telling the truth, but would you vote for him And as for Wendy Alexander, why didn't she ask questions?'
Anna Smith in the Sunday Mirror, 9 th December 2007.

'Scottish Labour were falling apart before our very eyes long before Wendy Alexander became leader and became entangled in the web of deceit spun around her campaign funding. The Nats are not stealing Labour's clothes because they had given them away and acquired no new garb in their place. The unanswered question is: what does Labour stand for, especially in Scotland?'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 9 th December 2007.

'Alexander faces a disciplinary probe after the parliament's Standards Commissioner, Dr Jim Dyer, received a complaint about her non-disclosure of donations on her MSP's register of interests.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 9 th December 2007.

'The Alexander debacle would not have happened if there had been a free flow of information among the party leadership. In 2005, Scottish general secretary Lesley Quinn ruled that a donation from Jersey tax exile Paul Green for Charles Gordon's 2005 Cathcart by-election campaign was illegal. Had Alexander's team taken Quinn into their confidence and shown her their list of donors, she would have warned them to steer clear of Green.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 9 th December 2007.

'One of Labour's biggest donors in Scotland has decided he will not give the party any more money until the controversy over funding has been cleared up. Glasgow businessman Willie Haughey has given Labour around one million pounds since 2003. His name emerged last week on a leaked list of donors to Wendy Alexander's campaign for leadership.'
STV News, 9 th December 2007.

'In a further blow to the party in the wake of the scandal over illegal donations, Scotland on Sunday can also reveal that a key local ally of Wendy Alexander is under police investigation following allegations of 'financial irregularities'. Tommy Williams, the former chairman of Alexander's own constituency party in Paisley and a prominent member of Renfrewshire Council, was sacked as a Glasgow City Council official last week amid claims time-sheets had been falsified.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 9 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander hasn't resigned yet, but her donors are considering their position. Willie Haughey, the Glasgow businessman who has bankrolled the Scottish Labour establishment to the tune of £1m, says he is cutting it off. He told a Sunday newspaper that he'd been assured his money had not been used to finance Wendy Alexander's campaign, when, of course, it had. The Scottish Labour leader is still insisting that she knew nothing of the crazy antics of her fundraisers. Unfortunately for her, she can't escape legal liability.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 10 th December 2007.

'All this has happened since the cash-for-honours scandal revealed that Labour had been raising secret loans from millionaires, who subsequently were nominated for knighthoods and peerages, 'a k or a big p'. All of which raises the question: has Labour lost, not only the plot, but also the will to survive?'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 10 th December 2007.

'The Electoral Commission are still studying documents sent to Alexander by her campaign team, after it emerged they wrongly accepted a donation of £950 from Jersey businessman Paul Green. Cathcart MSP Charlie Gordon has admitted he had misled the campaign team and resigned as transport spokesman, but has so far refused to quit over the row.'
The Daily Record, 10 th December 2007.

'For the party to be breaking its own laws on party funding in the aftermath of a scandal in which the former Prime Minister was interviewed twice by the police over sleaze simply beggars belief. It suggests that Labour has become so dependent on dodgy donations it's incapable of functioning without them.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 10 th December 2007.

'The Electoral Commission, set up by Labour to police the laws on funding, has an onerous responsibility here to act firmly and decisively. If it appears to be under sway from the political establishment then it will lose all credibility and our politics will descend into the mire.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 10 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander has found herself on the back foot for nearly a fortnight after it emerged that she accepted a £950 cheque from the retail tycoon Paul Green, despite the fact he lives in Jersey and is therefore ineligible to make political donations in the UK.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 11 th December 2007.

'The Electoral Commission is examining all the donations to Ms Alexander's campaign fund and could yet call in the police to launch their own investigation.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 11 th December 2007.

'Far better, surely, for the Scottish Tories to have bided their time than to have got into bed with Scottish Labour, a party still racked by scandal, and led by someone who says that she never breaks the law; at least not intentionally.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 11 th December 2007.

'Alexander's vow came after it emerged businessman Paul Green, a tax exile, had made a banned donation to her campaign. The funding row overshadowed Alexander's success last week in winning backing for a constitutional commission to investigate extra powers for Holyrood. Labour fear other initiatives will also be ignored while a possible police probe hangs over her.'
The Daily Record, 11 th December 2007.

'The Scottish police are investigating a small payment made by Paul Green, a Glasgow property man who lives in Jersey. It seems that Wendy Alexander, who won the Scottish Leadership election, may have known that the gift could be criticised. What is remarkable is the scale of the sum: £950. The Labour Party's funding must be in a parlous state if anyone would risk even the slightest question for the sake of a sum of that magnitude.'
Lord William Rees-Mogg in The Daily Reckoning, 11 th December 2007.

'After huffing and puffing for many a long day, Ms Alexander came up with the remarkable confession that she shouldn't take any of the blame for anything because she hadn't 'intentionally' broken the law. This was an admission that will find favour, I'm sure, with all of you out there who didn't intentionally break the speed limit or forget to pay your television licence. Equally, I'm sure that the relevant authorities accepted your unintentional law-breaking in good grace and didn't dock your licence or issue a fine.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 12 th December 2007.

'Mr Skene said the events of recent weeks - which have seen Wendy Alexander's political future placed in doubt over her leadership campaign team's decision to accept a £950 donation from a non-UK resident - have left him in no doubt that the law should be changed.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 12 th December 2007.

'The likelihood, however, is that Ms Alexander might be giving her explanations to the police, which is an altogether more serious prospect.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 12 th December 2007.

'The news comes as another blow to beleaguered Labour leader Wendy Alexander who is herself in the middle of a scandal over an illegal £950 donation which was made to her leadership campaign.'
Paisley Daily Express, 12 th December 2007.

'Any truth in the rumour that Wendy Alexander has asked Santa for a canoe?'
Tam Cowan in the Daily Record, 12 th December 2007.

'Does Labour welcome a diversion from the controversy over Wendy Alexander's campaign funding Yes.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland Political Editor, 13 th December 2007.

'Even keen observers might have missed the speech Wendy Alexander gave a few days ago at Edinburgh University. Though it was attended by a scrum of Scotland's journalists, their focus was on the party funding row that still stalks Scottish Labour.'
Charlie Jeffery in the Scotsman, 13 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander didn't raise the subject as bashing others about their integrity when you yourself are being investigated over illegal donations is not really an option for the Labour leader. Her party might care to ponder that fact.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 14 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander yesterday reshuffled the Labour front-bench team at Holyrood, following the resignation of Charlie Gordon for accepting illegal campaign contributions.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 14 th December 2007.

'Defiant Wendy Alexander, who is refusing to resign as Scottish Labour leader over the illegal donations row, has appointed a new party transport spokesman. Des McNulty replaces Charlie Gordon, who was forced to stand down after he solicited a £950 cheque from multi-millionaire tax exile Paul Green.'
Press & Journal, 14 th December 2007.

'Ever since Brown protected Geoffrey Robinson's undeclared offshore trust in 1998 and urged Treasury officials to ignore Robinson's relationship with Robert Maxwell, there have been doubts about Brown's veracity. The credibility of his moral compass' resurfaced repeatedly during his Treasury years. Recently those misgivings resurfaced with his protection of Wendy Alexander and Harriet Harman in connection with Labour's funding.'
Tom Bower in the Guardian, 14 th December 2007.

'Do you agree that Wendy Alexander has been hobbled by the very real sleaze and criminality that is at the heart of Scottish Labour?'
George Alexander in the Herald, 15 th December 2007.

'The inadequacy of legislation covering donations to Stormont parties was highlighted by the recent scandals at Westminster and Holyrood. There Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander was embroiled in a row over a donation to her leadership campaign from a Jersey-based businessman because it is illegal for people based off-shore to donate to a UK party.'
Henry McDonald in the Observer, 16 th December 2007.

'Douglas Alexander's name also arose in the context, through his sister, Wendy Alexander, a Labor (sic) leader in the Scottish parliament, who is also suspected of receiving an illegal donation.'
Adam Primor in Haaretz (Israel), 16 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader, faces a new crisis after it emerged that she and senior colleagues have given thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money to a company that helps with campaigns for the party.'
Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 16 th December 2007.

'Alexander is already under pressure to resign after she admitted receiving an illegal donation for her leadership campaign from Paul Green, a businessman based in Jersey who is not a UK voter. Now it has emerged that she, along with eight senior colleagues, used parliamentary allowances to pay £5,000 to Computing for Labour (CfL), a company owned by the party and based at its London headquarters. It provides IT services that are offered free by the Scottish parliament.'
Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 16 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander has already conceded that an offence was committed, for which she bears legal responsibility, in terms of the unlawful donation from Paul Green. And these latest stories raise a whole new set of questions. It is high time that the Electoral Commission got to grips with these serious matters.'
Roseanna Cunningham MSP (Scottish National Party), 16 th December 2007.

'For generations millions of people have given their votes to Labour in the belief that the party would champion the less well off. And the unions hand over millions of pounds every year to further the aims of their members. But it is clearer now that working people need a different political voice to represent them, in a way that Gordon Brown and his allies Harriet Harman, Wendy Alexander, Peter Hain and the likes will never do!'
Cliff Jones in Wales on Sunday, 16 th December 2007.

'Labour is in an entirely different position. It is currently being investigated by the Electoral Commission over illegal payments to Ms Alexander's leadership campaign and the police might yet be called in. It would be entirely hypocritical to support an inquiry into anyone else, whilst Labour's is unfinished. Still, this is politics and there's no shortage of hypocrites.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 17 th December 2007.

'The row has rumbled on while Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader, is investigated by the Electoral Commission after admitting accepting an illegal donation. Yesterday it emerged that she and senior colleagues had given thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money to a firm that campaigns for the party.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 17 th December 2007.

'Brown is even in danger of losing Scotland, if the opinion polls are any guide, and his own ally, Wendy Alexander, will likely be sacrificed in the New Year.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 17 th December 2007.

'The BBC are so cheap and dishonest, they could run for leadership of the Scottish Labour Party.'
Christina de Kéroualle on BBC News, 18 th December 2007.

'Ms Alexander has insisted she was not dishonest and had not knowingly broken the rules which ban non-UK registered voters from making donations to political parties.'
Press & Journal, 18 th December 2007.

'Labour's leader in Scotland, Wendy Alexander, has also been under intense pressure after accepting a donation of £950 towards her leadership campaign from a businessman in Jersey. One of her front-bench team resigned as a result.'
Greg Hurst in the Times, 18 th December 2007.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander was last night described as a 'lame duck leader'.'
Press & Journal, 18 th December 2007.

'Election watchdogs will not issue their findings on the illegal donation made to Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign until the New Year, it emerged yesterday. Ms Alexander handed over details of all contributions made to her campaign to the Electoral Commission a fortnight ago and it had been hoped that a decision on what course of action to take would be made by Christmas. But an Electoral Commission source yesterday revealed that it planned to make no comment on the matter until next year.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 19 th December 2007.

'Little Red Wendy the Hood then used the remainder of her ill-gotten gains to hire a Big Bad Wolf to huff and to puff and to blow down Alex's House. Unfortunately the wolf turned out to be a little-known, but contented pig named Nicol, who merely cried 'Me! Me! Me!' before breaking wind and trotting all the way home to his usual place at the trough.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 19 th December 2007.

'Any investigation into a donation given to Wendy Alexander's Scots Labour leadership campaign has been shelved until next year. Watchdogs said there would 'almost certainly' be no decision on whether to launch a full investigation or call in police before the end of the year. Alexander has admitted her leadership campaign received a £950 donation from property developer Paul Green. That's illegal as he is not a UK voter.'
Daily Record, 19 th December 2007.

'I have, of course, been making daily checks re progress in the Electoral Commission's inquiry into the funding of Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign. Don't expect anything, now, until early in the New Year.'
BBC Scotland Political Editor, Brian Taylor, 19 th December 2007.

'Ma brither wis right: 'Hing oan, hen,' he said, 'A week is a lang time hidin' in the lavvy.' He wis right. Nae sooner hud he uttered those wurds o' wisdom than yon skinny snotter Knickers Stephen had grabbed the limelight aff me wi' wild stories that Salmonella is in Dumb Trump's pocket. Or maybe it wis Trump wis pittin' money in Salmonella's pocket - ah cannae recall whit ah telt the wee snotter tae say. Ah've so many stories spinnin'.'
Alias 'Wendy' in the Herald, 19 th December 2007.

'When are Strathclyde's finest going to be chapping on Alexander's door a la Tommy Sheridan Maybe they should send round the British Transport Police instead as they seem to like harassing folk.'
Peter, in the Scotsman, 20 th December 2007.

'Wendy Alexander had a good session, always assuming that you forget - which Mr Salmond didn't - that she may well have a date with Strathclyde's finest after the New Year.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 21 st December 2007.

'Labour and the Liberal Democrats have struggled to come to terms with opposition. The Conservatives have had to guide them towards an alternative to the 'national conversation', a commission on more powers for the Scottish Parliament. Labour, in particular, have lost the sure touch of Jack McConnell who's gone off to do voluntary work in Malawi.'
John Knox, BBC Political Reporter, 22 nd December 2007.

'Labour end this annus horribilis in a terrible state, with a leadership crisis and a donations scandal. The new Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, has failed to offer any intellectual challenge to Alex Salmond's populist nationalism, and the party organisation is disintegrating.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 23 rd December 2007.

'The body investigating an illegal donation to Wendy Alexander's Labour leadership campaign has admitted its inquiry may lead to criminal proceedings against her and her allies.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 23 rd December 2007.

'Do lighten up. There I was sitting and thinking what to write about: the collapse of trust in politics, the climate-change challenge funked again, the tidal wave of debt sweeping the economy away, Wendy Alexander's prospects for 2008. But I said: no, enough wallowing in negativity.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 24 th December 2007.

'Scotland's parliamentarians include several talented singers and musicians. Alex Salmond gave a passable performance of 'The Rowan Tree' with Anne-Lorne Gilles, while Wendy Alexander has the reputation of being a formidable fiddler.'
Christina de Kéroualle, 25 th December 2007.

'Gordon Brown is reported to be giving Salmond the cold shoulder, still apparently in a huff over Labour's defeat at the Holyrood election. He seems to think that by ignoring the SNP they will somehow go away.
And where in all of this are Wendy Alexander and her cohorts'
Herald Editorial, 26 th December 2007.

'Meanwhile, nationalist insiders claim that the reliably tribal Gordon Brown has not returned Salmond's calls for nearly five months, and take no little delight in the travails of Labour's Scottish leader, Wendy Alexander, currently awaiting the verdict of the Electoral Commission on an illicit donation from yet another tycoon.'
John Harris in the Guardian, 27 th December 2007.

'During the election campaign, when Labour was obviously losing, Wendy Alexander, sister of the above Dougie, angrily condemned reports that she was preparing a bid for the Labour leadership as 'ill-informed, unsourced, malicious spin designed to benefit the SNP'. Her claim was not helped by the Noodle Gang Conspiracy, in which half a dozen senior Labour burdz met controversially for a Chinese takeaway in the flat of Wendy's pal Pauline McNeill, MSP. They claimed they were only discussing the interior decor at Holyrood, but conspiracy theorists said they were out to spear Jack's spicy prawn balls with their chopsticks.'
Robert McNeil in the Scotsman, 27 th December 2007.

'Labour became embroiled in a donations scandal which claimed the scalp of the party's General Secretary Peter Watt. Money was being given to Labour through intermediaries, which is against a law which clearly states donations must be transparent. In the fall out, Scotland's Labour leader Wendy Alexander, the party's national deputy leader Harriet Harman, and Trade and Industry Secretary Peter Hain all had to own up to taking opaque donations. The Electoral Commission asked Scotland Yard to investigate.'
Graham Dines in the East Anglian Daily Times, 28 th December 2007.

'Donorgate then raised its ugly head on both sides of the border. In Scotland, MSP Charlied Gordon had to resign as transport minister (sic) after soliciting an illegal campaign contribution for Labour's new leader, Wendy Alexander. A decision over whether Alexander will be made the subject of a police investigation will be made in the new year.'
Herald Review of the Year, 29 th December 2007.

'The dodgy donations affair was largely an inheritance from the Blair era. But that doesn't mean it won't damage Brown. His own protégé, Wendy Alexander faces an Electoral Commission probe over an illegal donation from a tax exile. If she doesn't handle things well in the coming months Brown may consider her expendable.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 30 th December 2007.

'The scandal spread to Scotland, where it was discovered that Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign had been financed by a series of £950 cheques - below the £1000 declaration threshold - one of which had come, illegally, from a non-UK resident.'
Torcuil Crichton in the Sunday Herald, 30 th December 2007.

'If the police are able to arrest Tommy Sherdian for alleged perjury, and raid his home, then who is to say they won't do the same to Alexander for accepting an illegal donation No-one expects it happen, of course, because Alexander is under the protection of Gordon Brown, the prime minister.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 30 th December 2007.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander was accused of being 'isolated' within her own party.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 31 st December 2007.

'With Scottish MPs rebelling against her leadership, Wendy Alexander seems increasingly isolated. The Electoral Commission must report as early as possible and as Ms Alexander and her team have admitted breaking the law it seems the only place for this investigation to go is either straight to the police or the procurator-fiscal. Breaking the law is breaking the law.'
Scottish National Party former Deputy Leader, Roseanna Cunningham MSP, 1 st January 2008.

'Labour's Holyrood leader Wendy Alexander was accused yesterday of going on a month-long 'self-imposed silence' since the Electoral Commission began investigating an illegal donation to her leadership campaign.'
Robbie Dunwoodie in the Herald, 2 nd January 2008.

'It's time Wendy Alexander came out of hiding and made her position clear.'
Scottish National Party MSP Kenneth Gibson, 2 nd January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has struggled to make an impact in admittedly difficult circumstances - Labour MSPs have found it extremely hard to accept the fact they are no longer in power. She also suffered the embarrassment of having two spin doctors resign after just weeks in the job. Then she was hit by the row over the illegal donation to her leadership campaign from a Jersey-based businessman. The heat has gone out of that row for the moment, while the Electoral Commission investigates, but it has damaged a party which was already badly bruised.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 3 rd January 2008.

'As well as the Miliband brothers - Ed and David - there is Douglas Alexander, whose sister, Wendy, clings on to her post as Leader of the Scottish Labour Party.'
Mark Stuart in the Yorkshire Post, 4 th January 2008.

'Tayside's Chief constable, John Vine said: 'Scotland's police will continue to work hard to do this and the message remains, 'Don't risk it! We will get you.' I think he was talking about drunk drivers, but then again, it might have been a warning for the disgraced Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander.'
Christina de Kéroualle, 5 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander only questioned the illegal donation to her leadership campaign after she personally thanked the Jersey tycoon at the centre of the row for his cheque. The Labour leader, who believes emails between herself and a campaign member will clear her of any 'intentional wrongdoing', first asked about Paul Green's contribution after it had been received, banked and acknowledged. The revelations cast doubt on whether Alexander took 'all reasonable steps', the phrase enshrined in law, to ensure the £950 donation was legal.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 6 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's inner circle continues to strike a note of defiant optimism, insisting that if - as they hope - the party leader is cleared over her role in the dodgy donation she received from an offshore businessman, she will come out fighting. But even those sympathetic to her are not encouraged. They do not blame Alexander for the party's woes, although the row over her donations has hardly helped. Instead, they are fearful for the very future of a party whose activist base of councillors and foot soldiers has been decimated. Some of the more candid Labour politicians are frank about how much better the SNP is at the business of government than they ever were.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 6 th January 2008.

'The fact that the SNP, Liberal Democrats, Conservatives and Greens all support the key recommendation - that Holyrood should take responsibility for running elections north of the border from Westminster - will make for a difficult return to action for Wendy Alexander as she awaits her fate in the Electoral Commission inquiry into donations.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 7 th January 2007.

'Wendy Alexander's election agent, Paisley councillor Terry Kelly, was under fire yesterday following an exchange on his website in which he dubbed women 'thick'.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 8 th January 2007.

'In November Charles Gordon MSP stood down as Labour's transport spokesman in the Scottish Parliament after admitting he had unwittingly misinformed the campaign team of Wendy Alexander, who became Scottish Labour leader in September, about the source of a £950 donation to her leadership campaign from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green, who was not a UK-registered voter.'
Sam Lister in the Daily Post (Wales), 9 th January 2008.

'Gordon Brown yesterday conspicuously failed to back the call by Wendy Alexander and other political leaders in Scotland for Holyrood to be given more powers, particularly over tax.'
Michael Settle in the Herald, 9 th January 2008.

STV poll, 10 th January 2008.

'There is worrying news for Wendy Alexander with the poll showing she has failed to make an impact with voters.'
Bernard Ponsonby on STV news, 10 th January 2008.

'There is a hungry caterpillar somewhere that is starting to eat its own tail and does not have long for this world.'
Christina McKelvie MSP, 10 th January 2008.

'Labour in Scotland is still waiting for the result of the Electoral Commission investigation into illegal donations made in Wendy Alexander's leadership campaign.'
The Herald, 11 th January 2008.

'Unlike Ms Alexander, Mr Hain did not take cash from anyone barred from donating. But that does not mean he is in the clear.'
Guardian editorial, 12 th January 2008.

'Gordon Brown is thought to be reluctant to force Mr Hain to resign, not least because his departure would cast doubt on the future of two other senior figures, Harriet Harman, the party's deputy leader, and Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader in Scotland, both still embroiled in their own fund-raising crises.'
Duncan Hooper in the Telegraph, 13 th January 2008.

'The Labour leader's team had been under the impression that donations under £1000, regardless of origin, were permissable, including the £950 from Jersey-based Paul Green that has rocked her leadership for the past six weeks. However, after they realised they had misinterpreted electoral law, the cash was instead registered in the name of Combined Property Services (CPS). Alexander and her team are being investigated by the Electoral Commission after admitting they accepted the donation as part of her leadership campaign. Her campaign members have consistently declined to answer questions on why and when CPS was first named as the source of the Green cash.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 13 th January 2008.

'No 10 reasserted 'full confidence' in Mr Hain yesterday but this is more pragmatism than genuine support, as he is not the only senior Labour figure to have infringed party funding laws. Deputy leader Harriet Harman accepted a proxy donation from the notorious David Abrahams and Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander a gift from a Jersey-based businessman. The Prime Minister may feel that dumping Mr Hain now would begin a damaging chain reaction.'
Daily Mail editorial, 13 th January 2008.

'What have they got to hide Why do Labour politicians create complex and often illegal conduits to disguise the obvious fact that they get a lot of their money from businessmen This is the question at the heart of the recent spate of donations scandals involving Wendy Alexander, Peter Hain and others. Invariably, the trouble began, not with the donations themselves, but with the way Labour politicians tried to divert attention from them.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 14 th January 2007.

'First Minister Alex Salmond yesterday claimed that the Labour Party north and south of the border is guilty of a 'systemic' abuse of the electoral law they introduced. Mr Salmond's comments came as Wendy Alexander spoke publicly for the first time in nearly six weeks on the illegal donations row dogging her leadership of the party in Scotland.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 14 th January 2008.

'This was supposed to be the week the Scottish Labour leader fought back. Fully expecting to be exonerated, she was planning to seize the constitutional initiative and move on. But it was not to be. Suddenly, all the talk is of dodgy donations again and once more the press is testing for shoogles on Wendy's peg. If Peter Hain goes, she may not be far behind.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 14 th January 2007.

'The individual sums involved in donations may sometimes appear to be trivial, as in Alexander's case, but that actually isn't really the point. By cultivating these links, and trying to hush them up, the damage is already done to their probity. Worse, they have broken the zero-tolerance laws and codes that were designed by their own party to stamp out sleaze. Which is why both Wendy Alexander and Peter Hain are now damaged goods - even if they cling to their jobs.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 14 th January 2007.

'Asked for the Prime Minister's views regarding plans, promoted by Wendy Alexander, to support greater powers for Scottish Parliament, the PMS said that the Prime Minister thought it was a good thing that the respective parties in Scotland were having a debate about this issue but that he would want to wait for the outcome of those discussions before commenting further.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 15 th January 2007.

'The idea of a commission was dreamed up by Ms Alexander with the aim of getting Scottish Labour out of a hole of its own making. She came up with the wheeze in the midst of her dodgy donations crisis - a crisis that is still unresolved - and the surprise was that the other parties helped her.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 15 th January 2007.

'Asked if the Prime Minister was meeting with Wendy Alexander, the PMS replied that we would not normally comment on the Prime Minister's private engagements.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 15 th January 2007.

'Peter Hain may have Wendy Alexander to thank for his political survival. Labour's Scottish leader has been in dire straights, with abysmal personal opinion ratings, and a deeply hostile press since it emerged in November that her election campaign had accepted an illegal donation from a tax-exile businessman. It's believed that Gordon Brown has ruled that Hain cannot go - at least not until Alexander is out of trouble.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 15 th January 2008.

'The pressure on the Electoral Commission to come up with the right result for the government is intense. The commission was set up by Labour under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act, 2000, and prominent on its political advisory board is the former general secretary of the Scottish Labour party, Lord Elder, a Brown friend. MPs and MSPs are supremely confident that Alexander will be exonerated, though they are not so sure about Hain.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 15 th January 2008.

'The Electoral Commission now has an onerous responsibility. If it appears to be providing ex-post facto justifications for senior Labour politicians, who have broken their own laws against sleaze, then it will cease to retain public confidence. Created as a means of improving respect for politics, it could be about to become another factor in its decline.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 15 th January 2008.

'The Scottish Six are: Des Browne Labour MP for Kilmarnock and Loudoun and (part-time) Secretary of State for Scotland, Alistair Carmichael Lib-Dem MP for Orkney and Shetlands, David Mundell Conservative MP for Dumfrieshire, Clydesdale and Tweesdale (sic), Wendy Alexander Labour MSP for Paisley South, Annabel Goldie Conservative MSP for the West of Scotland and Nicol Stephen Lib-Den (sic) MSP for Aberdeen South. They are meeting in a state of intense inter-party anxiety. One thing unites them, their opposition to the Scottish National Party. The latest You-Gov poll for the Scottish Daily Express has put the SNP nine points ahead of Labour in the constituency vote, and of course streets ahead of the Lib-Dem and the Tory parties. They meet under the banner of defence of the Union. Their principal concern however is the survival of their parties in Scotland.'
Campaign for an English Parliament Press Release, 16 th January 2008.

'Mr Brown's appeal failed to gain the complete backing of Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader at Holyrood. 'There is a free vote in the House of Commons on this. It is for MPs to vote in the way they feel most appropriate,' said her spokesman.'
Michael Settle and Damien Henderson in the Herald, 17 th January 2008

'It's tough. It is hard. Still and all, that was not a good showing by Labour's Wendy Alexander in the chamber today. For one thing, she lacked focus.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland's political editor, 17 th January 2008.

'First Minister's Questions at Holyrood doesn't often hit the high spots but yesterday it plumbed new depths. It was dire. Most of the blame for this should be attached to the Labour leader, Wendy Alexander.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 18 th January 2008.

'So what were we to make of the rest of the proceedings yesterday Well, Wendy Alexander went off with a bit of a scattergun approach. I know FMQs is plural but they don't all have to come from the same person. Sportscotland, youth courts, police numbers, police pensions: a lot of bullets were fired, and while it may have been a bit unlucky not to hit the FM, the fact that all those around him emerged unscathed might indicate this was not Ms Alexander's finest hour.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 18 th January 2007.

'If truth be told, we'd probably not need much in the way of changes if the leader of the main opposition party was up to the task. And currently she most assuredly is not.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 18 th January 2008.

'This week our pantomime has been 'Wendy and the Lost Boys'. Wendy is supposed to be the sensible sister, looking after her lost boys in the Labour Party as it struggles to take to the air again after its election crash in May. But for Wendy Alexander, it's not been a good week.'
John Knox, Political reporter, BBC Scotland, 19 th January 2008.

'Alexander prepared her excuses for the failure to implement any proposals from a Constitutional Commission in the same speech that she launched the idea.'
James Mitchell in the Herald, 19 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander will face a challenge to her leadership of Scottish Labour unless she improves her performance by the party's spring conference, senior allies have warned.'
Sunday Times, 20 th January 2008.

'I'd like to give you the inside story of last week's historic summit in London of the new Scottish constitutional commission. But the leading light, Wendy Alexander, isn't talking to me. Something I said, apparently. Now I know what it is to be 'Wendied'.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 20 th January 2008.

'This time they would get Wendy Alexander. Or her successor. She hopes to paint the SNP as 'tartan Tories' who, when they aren't trying to break up Britain, are only interested in Donald Trump, cutting business rates and tax breaks for the well-off, such as the inheritance tax cut we report today. Mind you, if Labour are so concerned about the poor and dispossessed, the question is why they didn't do more for them in the decade they were in office.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 20 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander and her team have admitted breaking the law - surely the only procedure in this case should be a police investigation.'
Ex SNP Deputy Leader Roseanna Cunningham MSP, 22 nd January 2008.

'The Electoral Commission has admitted fundamental weaknesses in its ability to probe allegations of illegal donations to political parties. An official document seen by The Herald shows that detailed procedures and guidance on how investigations should be carried out remain 'in development', despite the fact that high-profile probes into allegations against senior Labour figures, including Scottish leader Wendy Alexander, are currently under way.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 23 rd January 2008.

'Ms Alexander is being given her head only because there's no desire in London to take her on - yet. And even with the weekly evidence of her unsuitability for leadership there's no one in Scottish Labour's ranks prepared to challenge her.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 23 rd January 2008.

'Labour MSP Jackie Baillie revealed that Wendy Alexander was involved in the decision to solicit donations of less than £1000 for her leadership campaign, thereby ensuring all those who gave money could remain anonymous.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 23 rd January 2008.

'Any perceived whitewash on the Wendygate donation affair will do Wendy Alexander more damage than anything else.'
David Mcewan Hill in the Daily Record, 23 rd January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander (Labour's leader in Scotland) has been in trouble for receiving an overseas donation that was out of order. This resignation leaves the door open for others to point at these figures and say: 'If Hain's had to resign, then they, too, should go.' This is exactly what Mr Brown wanted to avoid.'
Philip Webster, Political editor in the Times, 24 th January 2008.

'Mr Brown was reluctant to lose his minister because to do so would recall the 'bad old days"' of Tony Blair's regime and might increase the pressure on others caught up in the running rows over donations - notably Harriet Harman and Wendy Alexander in Scotland.'
Nick Assinder, Political correspondent, BBC News website, 24 th January 2008.

'Ms Alexander is keen to draw a distinction between illegal and impermissible actions. She knows - and regrets - that her campaign manager Tom McCabe acknowledged, in response to a question from me, that Team Alexander broke the law.'
BBC Scotland Political Editor, Brian Taylor, 24 th January 2008

'The Police have a duty under Section 17 of the Police (Scotland) Act 1967 to investigate allegations of criminality. Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander's team has already publicly admitted the law has been broken. The protocol which exists between the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland and the Crown Office (the prosecuting authority) which dictates that complaints related to electoral law should be determined by the Electoral Commission, has no weight under Scots law. Failure by the Police to investigate runs contrary to their Statutory Duties under the Police Act. Quangos should not be deciding who faces justice and who does not. That has always been the role of the Police. If Alexander gets away with this then it is one law for Labour and another for the rest of the public. New Labour may think they are above the law, and if the Police take no action then it is clear they are. What message does that send out?'
Mark Hirst in the Times, 25 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was last night under renewed pressure to stand down as leader of the Scottish Labour Party after the resignation of a UK cabinet minister.'
Steve Bargeton, political editor, in the Courier, 25 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's future as leader of the Labour Party in Scotland was under fresh scrutiny last night following Peter Hain's resignation. The Electoral Commission was also urged to speed up its investigations into the illegal donation to Ms Alexander's Labour leadership campaign.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 25 th January 2008.

'The resignation of Cabinet Minister Peter Hain piled pressure on Wendy Alexander to quit over an illegal donation to her Scots Labour leadership campaign.'
Daily Record, 25 th January 2008.

'The irony that the sometimes huge funds involving all sorts of people in the Labour hierarchy that may yet touch Gordon Brown and even includes Snow White herself, Wendy Alexander, were for internal political campaigns matters little. The bottom line is that if illicit donations can help buy power then they can help buy influence, and whether or not it's for an election to Party or Government office, they must be above board.'
Brain Monteith in the Evening News, 25 th January 2008.

'More attention on Ms Harman is the last thing Downing Street wants, especially as Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader in Scotland, is also waiting for the commission to decide on a donation to her leadership campaign. Ms Alexander's brother Douglas sits in the Prime Minister's Cabinet and all three are close political allies.'
Tomos Livingston in the Western Mail (Wales), 25 th January 2008.

'Police are still investigating donations made through proxies to the Labour Party, and the Electoral Commission is probing cash given to Harriet Harman - who won the deputy leadership - and Wendy Alexander, Labour leader in Scotland.'
Jonathan Reed Political Editor in the Yorkshire Post, 25 th January 2008.

'My Burns Day got off to a terrible start when I choked on my first coffee of the day. The cause of this was one of those 'did she really say that?' moments, while listening to Good Morning Scotland. Jackie Baillie, stout defender of the indefensible, had been sent out to bat on behalf of Wendy Alexander.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 25 th January 2008.

'So on a bad morning it was time to send in Jackie to the BBC studio to do battle. Unfortunately, I was mid-sip when Ms Baillie said the following: 'If the Electoral Commission judge that there has been intentional wrongdoing, by either Wendy or one of her campaign team, I would have thought she had even more reason to stay on and fight for her reputation. At the end of the day the decision would be hers, but I would sincerely hope that she didn't resign because frankly Wendy has been getting on with the job she was elected to do and I think she should be given the opportunity to do so.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 25 th January 2008.

'Ms Baillie has taken her defence of Ms Alexander to a whole new level by saying that even if she is found to have intentionally broken the law she should stay on as Labour's Holyrood leader anyway. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions said he had no choice but to resign in order to be free to defend his actions to the police. But the leader of the Labour Party in the Scottish Parliament must refuse to resign in order to defend her actions.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 25 th January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander will not quit as Scottish Labour leader, even if election watchdogs decide to call in the police over the illegal donation to her leadership campaign, one of her closest advisers claimed yesterday. Jackie Baillie, Labour's Shadow Minister for Parliamentary Business at Holyrood, insisted Ms Alexander would not follow the example of Peter Hain. He stood down as Work and Pensions Secretary on Thursday after the Electoral Commission asked the Metropolitan Police to investigate his failure to declare £103,000 in donations to his deputy leadership campaign. Ms Baillie said Ms Alexander would 'stay on and fight for her reputation' even if the Electoral Commission decides she has broken the law.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 26 th January 2008.

'SNP MSP Roseanna Cunningham accused Ms Baillie of either 'extreme bluster or increasing arrogance'. She said: 'Jackie Baillie claims that even if Wendy Alexander is found guilty she should stay in office. Ms Alexander's dodgy donation may not be as large as Peter Hain's but it was, by Labour's own admission, illegal. Peter Hain's resignation has clearly increased the pressure on Wendy Alexander. Surely it is inconceivable that, if found guilty, Ms Alexander would think it acceptable to stay on as leader of the opposition. Perhaps Labour in Scotland genuinely do consider themselves to be above the law'.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 26 th January 2008.

'The inquiry is relevant to all the parties, these days, but something is amiss when the people's party appears to run out of people. In Scotland, if we believe what we are told, Wendy Alexander never intended to do wrong, yet could not drum up a couple of dozen folk prepared to hold a whip-round for £950.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 26 th January 2008.

'Perhaps because she was head girl at a posh English public school, Mrs Baillie is regularly wheeled out to defend her boss in the media but her appearances on television and radio are getting increasingly embarrassing, not so say bizarre. There was an excruciating appearance on Newsnight at the beginning of December where the MSP famously refused to answer anything of substance concerning the illegal donation. Yesterday, we were treated to another memorable performance on BBC radio's Good Morning Scotland when the lady again insisted that there was no need for Ms Alexander to resign her position because if she had broken the law she hadn't done it intentionally. What she seemed to be saying is that even if the Electoral Commission find against her, she shouldn't have to resign for no other reason than she is the leader of the Scottish Labour Party.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 26 th January 2008.

'Legislate in haste; repent at leisure. When Labour passed the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, it was meant to be the final word on sleaze. The law was to be zero tolerance, strict liability, and would clean up politics once and for all. No-one was to escape the net. But they never expected the net to catch an entire shoal of Labour fish wriggling in disbelief.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'The mystery is why Labour politicians were so ignorant of their own law. The Electoral Commission assigned £180,000 for education programmes to ensure party officers and elected members would be in no doubt of their obligation to obey the letter of it. Not money well spent, it seems.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'Gordon Brown's donations nightmare deepened further last night as another of his Cabinet ministers was accused of accepting cash through a proxy. Newspaper reports claimed that immigrant Waseem Siddiqui was used to channel more than £3000 to Alan Johnson's failed campaign to become deputy Labour leader. However, the 50-year-old said he did not know who the health secretary was, and his brother - a Labour official - had asked him to write a blank cheque.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'The Electoral Commission - a Labour creation - now bears an onerous responsibility. It has become the guardian of political probity, and holds in its hands the very future of the government. If it decides this week that other Labour figures should, like Hain, have their cases referred to the boys in blue, then the damage to Gordon Brown's administration will be incalculable. If his Scottish leader, his UK deputy leader, a slew of senior office-bearers and others we don't even know about are forced to resign, then it would be curtains.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'I wouldn't like to be the legal eagle in the Electoral Commission who has to adjudicate on the Alexander episode - it looks like a no-win situation. If she's exonerated, a lot of people will claim a cover-up; if they call in the law, it's probably the end of her career. Either way, the very foundations of this government are shaking - and we'll learn in a few days whether Labour's own law is going to be Alexander's undoing.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'A Jersey businessman, Paul Green, gave £950 to Alexander's campaign after an approach from her team, in what her supporters later conceded was a breach of the law requiring donations to be from UK-based voters or companies. Labour colleague Jackie Baillie said she was 'very confident' that Alexander would be cleared of any intentional wrongdoing and should not resign even if the commission ruled against her. SNP MSP Roseanna Cunningham said: 'Labour appears to be putting itself not just above the law but ahead of the law. Des Browne and the Labour Party must have an inside track to the Electoral Commission, otherwise his pronouncements may be premature. If Wendy Alexander and her campaign team are going to get away with what they admit was breaking the law, the Electoral Commission should be open about it.'.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 27 th January 2008.

'Wendy's people did her no favours over the weekend by declaring that she would not resign even if her case was handed on to the police. The Labour MSP Jackie Baillie said that, unlike Peter Hain, Alexander would 'stay on and fight for her reputation'. I don't know what planet she's living on, but it's not this one.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 28 th January 2008.

'The Secretary of State for Scotland, Des Browne, then blundered on to the scene by announcing on yesterday's Politics Show that there would be no more Labour resignations in the donations row. How does he know This was a crazy statement to make. For a start, it makes it look as if Labour is above the law. It also lends credence to the rumour that there had been a kind of 'plea bargaining' deal struck with the Electoral Commission under which Wendy Alexander and Harriet Harman would be allowed to walk, provided Peter Hain took the rap. If the Electoral Commission did enter into such a deal, it would be beyond its authority and would constitute a real scandal. By what right would it usurp the justice system And who is Des Browne to decide when politicians resign He has undermined the credibility of the Electoral Commission and has prepared the ground for an assault on Wendy's integrity almost whatever the commission says this week.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 28 th January 2008.

'As neat as Macwhirter's summary is; there is one point missed and I mentioned it yesterday. The Electoral Commission is not in a position to decide to what degree the law has been broken. Alexander's team has admitted there was a breach of electoral rules and she has taken on the the stance of a schoolchild yelling that 'a big girl with pigtails did it and ran away'. The brutal fact is under the Scottish Law, the Police are duty-bound to investigate and decisions on the degree of illegality do not rest with Commission or Scots Polis. Their Lordships, at worst, or their Worships, at best, have the final say in the matter. There is no easy way forward or out for Alexander. Even if she survives this, her credibility is shot to pieces and it's a racing certainty she will never serve as a Scottish First Minister. The goose, or in this case wide-mouthed frog, may be cooked and a Premier and Deputy Premier along with her.'
Anorak UK Editorial, 28 th January 2008.

'A former minister was yesterday forced to deny he was plotting to take over from Wendy Alexander as Labour leader. Andy Kerr insisted reports he was preparing a leadership bid were 'drivel and nonsense'. Former health minister Kerr said: 'Wendy Alexander is the leader and will be for some time.' But the SNP dismissed his denials and claimed the 'vultures were circling' Alexander as the dodgy donations row over her leadership campaign funding dragged on.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 28 th January 2008.

'Former health minister Andy Kerr yesterday dismissed reports that he was ready to replace Wendy Alexander as Labour leader. The SNP was quick to seize on the issue, claiming the 'vultures are circling' the Paisley North MSP.'
Press & Journal, 28 th January 2008.

'Beleagured Wendy Alexander's position appeared even weaker yesterday amid fresh speculation that colleague Andy Kerr is touting for her job. The Scottish Labour leader has come under increasing pressure to quit after her campaign team admitted they had accepted an illegal donation during her unopposed bid to succeed Jack McConnell. She faces an Electoral Commission probe and possible prosecution over the affair. Further misery was heaped on her by Peter Hain's resignation, amid allegations that he, too, had received illegal donations. Mr Kerr was yesterday forced to deny he is ready to replace Ms Alexander and said she had his full backing. But privately many Labour insiders believe that he is being groomed as a successor.'
Derek Watson in the Daily Express, 28 th January 2008.

'Labour's theme tune used to be 'things can only get better'. In 1997, it referred to the Tories. But now, sadly, those words apply to Labour themselves.'
Daily Record Editorial, 28 th January 2008.

'During her reign, she has so far failed to land a blow on First Minister Alex Salmond. And, in a sign of just how bad the crisis has become, a senior colleague had to go on national TV yesterday to dampen down weekend speculation that he is ready to succeed her. It is no surprise her SNP opponents are taunting her with claims that the 'vultures are circling'. The tragedy is, they don't really mean it. They see Alexander, who is trailing the Nats in the polls, as an asset. And they are hoping she can cling on to her job.'
Daily Record Editorial, 28 th January 2008.

'Labour nearly won the last Holyrood election. It is hard to believe how far they lag behind the SNP today. And, if Alexander can't even get them back to where they were less than a year ago, there is simply no hope she will ever become First Minister.'
Daily Record Editorial, 28 th January 2008.

'Some years after the Second World War, there were reports of Japanese soldiers found on distant Pacific islands refusing to surrender their arms, convinced they were still at war. A similar problem is currently facing the Scottish Labour Party, if sources close to Wendy Alexander are to be believed.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 29 th January 2008.

'Sir Tom Hunter, Scotland's richest man, has called for an overhaul of Britain's system of political donations and said he wished he had not donated to Labour in the past. The entrepreneur, who is one of Britain's biggest philanthropists, said political parties should not have to depend on rich men for their survival. The billionaire, who gave £100,000 to Labour in 2001, said: 'With hindsight I wouldn't have done it.' His comments come as Labour struggles to shake off questions around donations made to several ministers including Harriet Harman, Alan Johnson and Wendy Alexander.'
Jim Pickard and Alex Barker in the Financial Times, 29 th January 2008.

'The vultures are circling round Wendy Alexander, say the headlines, though it is not clear if said scavengers are her opponents, her colleagues or merely those in the media who relish the scent of political blood. Her problem is not just that dodgy donation to help her fight a leadership contest that didn't take place. It is also that, nine months on, the party whose leader once said he had no reverse gear is struggling to engage anything else.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 29 th January 2008.

'On the other hand, her opponents should be careful what they wish for. Do they really want a change of leader and a fresh start for Labour Ms Alexander may be more use to her opponents if she remains, damaged, in post.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 29 th January 2008.

'Serious concerns have been raised within Scottish Labour that the donations inquiry, as well as internal disputes over Ms Alexander's moves towards more devolved powers for the Scottish Parliament, could force her from the top post, only four months after she was elected unopposed to succeed Jack McConnell.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 30 th January 2008.

'Meanwhile, the Scottish Labour hierarchy has been embarking on a charm offensive with Scottish journalists, at pains to point out that Wendy has the full backing of all her fellow Labour MSPs - aimed at dampening down rising speculation that former Health Minister, Andy Kerr, is preparing to take over as leader should she stand down. However, as Andy Nicoll, the political editor of The Scottish Sun, succinctly told Newsnight Scotland, the wooing of the media by Wendy's supporters had merely produced 'cack-handed media management'.'
All Media Scotland, 31 st January 2008.

'In the Daily Telegraph, Kate Devlin, its Scottish political correspondent, has stressed the importance of the Daily Record appearing to turn against Alexander, evidenced by 'an excoriating editorial comment' on Monday. Pointed out Kate: 'It is the loss of support from Scotland's most stridently Labour newspaper that will concern the leadership.' In its editorial, the Daily Record declared: 'No one could have predicted how far fortunes would slump in just nine months. And they only have themselves to blame. They have made too many mistakes', adding: ' If Alexander can't even get them back to where they were less than a year ago, there is simply no hope she will ever become First Minister'.'
All Media Scotland, 31 st January 2008.

'There is a madness in the air when house room is given to the sort of nonsense emanating from the wilder fringes of the SNP and Tories. Fortunately, Ms Alexander's place as Labour's leader in the Scottish Parliament is a matter for her, her colleagues in the parliamentary party and party members. The spectacle of her being hounded by the attack dogs of an SNP-Tory coalition can but bolster her considerable support.'
Ex-Labour MSP Brian Fitzpatrick in the Herald, 31 st January 2008.

'The argument that she was unaware the donations were illegal and should therefore be exhonerated is flawed. It could be described as 'the Fagin defence'. In this scenario, Fagin (Ms Alexander) sends out the urchins (the campaign team) to acquire money from victims (donors). When the urchins return with ill gotten gains, Fagin accepts it gratefully. When the coppers (Electoral Commission) arrive, Fagin can truthfully say he has no idea who 'donated' the money and any wrongdoing was the fault of his charges, the urchins. According to Mr Fitzpatrick, Fagin is completely innocent as he did not steal the money himself but only accepted ill gotten gains acquired by the urchins. Unfortunately for him, the law says different.'
Stuart Allan in the Herald, 31 st January 2008.

'Wendy Alexander is a disgrace to politics and that's saying something. In a way I hope she remains as she will speed the destruction of Neo Labour in Scotland. But then again, I'll enjoy the justice of her ignominious departure from Scottish political life. And Andy Kerr is waiting in the wings, sharpening. something. I speak as someone who supported the Labour Party, voted for them and even leafleted for them until around 2003. I despair for those who haven't found the courage to abandon them.'
Martin McDonald in the Herald, 31 st January 2008.

'Brian Fitzpatrick has clearly set himself up as principal apologist for the beleaguered Wendy Alexander. Strangely, he takes a pop at me for calling for Ms Alexander's resignation. This I have never done, and I might have expected an advocate of Mr Fitzpatrick's standing to be more sure of his facts before rushing in to print. Should Ms Alexander face criminal charges, on this evidence she would be well advised to seek legal representation elsewhere.'
Murdo Fraser MSP, Deputy Leader, Scottish Conservatives, 1 st February 2008.

'Dear me. Wendy Alexander is to be exempted from perfectly legitimate criticism, according to Brian Fitzpatrick. Paradoxically, he himself has never failed to employ personal invective when it suited him. He does so again in the letters page while attempting to cast that perfectly legitimate criticism as somehow unacceptable.
Lest we forget two salient facts, I would remind him how this whole saga started. First, the existence of the illegal donation came to light in the pages of a Sunday newspaper. I had uttered not one word of comment about the story until after First Minister's Questions on the Thursday of that week, during which Wendy Alexander chose to 'defend' herself by attempting to smear named members of the SNP, myself included.
Secondly, soon after that performance a spokesperson for Wendy Alexander admitted on television that the law had been broken. If he is seeking to understand why I have commented throughout this saga he needs only re-read those two paragraphs. Does Brian Fitzpatrick really believe that a conspiracy of silence on the part of politicians does themselves or the public any favours?'
Roseanna Cunningham, SNP MSP, 1 st February 2008.

'Arguing that it was an inadvertent mistake and that there was no intentional wrongdoing, as Wendy Alexander and her supporters have repeatedly claimed, is no defence in law, and the size of the illegal donation is also irrelevant. These factors can be pleaded only in mitigation, not to establish innocence, as I am sure Brian Fitzpatrick knows. And it is always a serious matter if a senior politician breaks the law, because it casts doubt on the integrity of politicians and diminishes that person's reputation and authority, especially if leader of a party.'
Iain A D Mann in the Herald, 1 st February 2008.

'In Miss Alexander's case, there are problems with a plea of mitigation:
1. She wrote to the donor, in Jersey, thanking him.
2. The donation was misrepresented by attributing it to a company.
3. As the registered donee, she is responsible for the activities of all persons involved in the matter.
This affair cannot be allowed to go away or be brushed aside.'
John Scott Roy in the Herald, 1 st February 2008.

'Holyrood's standards watchdog has told Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander she was wrong not to declare donations to her leadership campaign.'
BBC Scotland News, 1 st February 2008.

'The Scottish Labour Leader Wendy Alexander has had to admit that she has made another mistake in accounting for donations to her leadership campaign. She has now declared all contributions over £520 in the Scottish Parliament's register of interests having previously believed she was under no obligation to do so.'
Brian Ponsonby on STV News, 1 st February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's Leadership campaign banked ten cheques in a one week period from various individuals and companies. They were all just short of £1,000. One cheque was made illegally and is being probed by the electoral commission.'
Brian Ponsonby on STV News, 1 st February 2008.

'Meanwhile, as was reported in this space exactly one week ago, the antics of those who purport to be acting in the Labour leader's best interests grow ever more bizarre. This is especially the case in relation to Jackie Baillie, Labour's business manager at Holyrood. Infamous now for her ludicrous TV and radio performances in supposed support of her leader, Mrs Baillie topped even that behaviour this week by dishing out detailed 'crib' sheets to shadow cabinet members and ordering them to phone editors and journalists to back their leader.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 2 nd February 2008.

'That Mrs Baillie felt that this was appropriate behaviour speaks volumes about her total unsuitability to hold down such a senior post, but that experienced politicians such as her front bench still contains should knuckle down and obey such absurd strictures tells us even more about the totally decrepit state of the Labour Party in Scotland today.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 2 nd February 2008.

'Yesterday's events were another blow to Ms Alexander's beleaguered leadership after a leak from inside her shadow cabinet revealed how orchestrated this week's publicity drive on her behalf had been. The leak of her shadow cabinet paper was embarrassing both for its content, which told MSPs what to say to journalists, and for the fact that someone inside her inner circle had been prepared to release it. The script stated:" I'm phoning because the whole of the Labour shadow cabinet is united behind Wendy's leadership and is fed up reading otherwise in the papers." .'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 2 nd February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander made a major U-turn yesterday and named the secret donors who backed her leadership bid. The Labour leader made a voluntary register of interests as she was on the brink of being ordered to name names. But last night she insisted she had not been forced into the move. It came after Holyrood's Standards Commissioner Jim Dyer indicated she should declare the cash in her register of interests.'
Dave King in the Daily Record, 2 nd February 2008.

The controversy surrounding Wendy Alexander's campaign funding reignited last night after a Holyrood watchdog told her to register the names and gifts of every donor. Dr Jim Dyer, the Standards Commissioner, ruled that Ms Alexander had been wrong not to declare some donations to her campaign for the leadership of Scottish Labour.'
Gerri Peev in the Scotsman, 2 nd February 2008.

'THE DONORS
Mike Rutterford
The property magnate was founder of the Archangel investment group. Rutterford was also the brains behind the successful Stewart Wise Ogilvie estate agency before Archangel. He gave £999.
Neil Davidson
The QC was Solicitor-General from 2000 to 2001. In March 2006, he was appointed Advocate General for Scotland - chief legal adviser to the UK government on Scottish law. He gave £995.
Martin Dempsey
A donation of £995 was made by Dempsey's firm Strathvale Holdings. He is the son of property tycoon Brian Dempsey, a former Celtic director. Dempsey snr donated £100,000 to Labour in 1997.
Willie Haughey
Haughey's firm, City Refrigeration, gave £995 to the Alexander campaign. The selfmade millionaire is one of the Labour Party's biggest donors, with gifts of about £1million UK-wide in the last five years.
John McGuire
Phoenix Car Company, run by McGuire, gave £995 to the Alexander leadership campaign. The 53-year-old father of four was born in Neilston, Renfrewshire, and now lives in Newton Mearns, Glasgow.
GMB Scotland
The union donated £999 to the campaign.
John Lyons
A former Labour MP gave £995.
David Pitt-Watson
Former Labour director of finance gave £990.
Nicholas Kuenssberg
Ex-Scottish Environmental Protection Agency. £995
Paul Green
Businessman whose £950 sparked investigation.'
Dave King in the Daily Record, 2 nd February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has been reported to the procurator fiscal for failing to register her leadership campaign donations. Dr Jim Dyer, the standards commissioner, has sent a report to the area fiscal in Lothian and Borders after concluding there was evidence the Labour leader broke the rules on declaring gifts. She now faces a police investigation and possible charges if the fiscal concludes the offence warrants a criminal sanction.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'It was reported on Friday that Dyer had notified Alexander that any donations she received over £520 should have been registered as gifts, a ruling that prompted the Labour leader to publish a selection of her financial backers. However, the Sunday Herald understands that Dyer also sent a report on the Alexander case to the area fiscal in Lothian and Borders on Friday. He also notified Alexander and the Parliament's Standards Committee about his actions, which will cause ructions within the Scottish political world.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'The Scottish Labour Party is much more than the diminutive person of Wendy Alexander and it is in a mess. Labour's election machine treats seats with a majority of under 3,000 as marginal, and on that count 21 Holyrood constituencies are at risk. A harsher truth is that Scottish politics are in such a state of flux and loyalties are so volatile, that no seat can be regarded as safe.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has said she will not step down as Scottish Labour leader, after being reported to prosecutors for not declaring donations. The Holyrood watchdog referred her to the procurator fiscal for not recording gifts to her leadership campaign in the MSPs' register of interests. Ms Alexander described the development as a" distraction" , and insisted she had followed all guidance.'
BBC Scotland News, 3 rd February 2008.

'In a separate development, the Sunday Herald can reveal Team Alexander gave a false account of the source of the illegal campaign donation that has engulfed her leadership for two months. An on-camera statement from November claimed that the £950 cheque from Paul Green had been handed to Alexander's leadership campaign" under the auspices" of a company called Combined Property Services (CPS). However, the claim has since been withdrawn in the course of interviews with the body currently investigating the donations to Alexander's war-chest.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008

'The report to the fiscal is a devastating blow for Alexander, who has repeatedly insisted she is innocent of any" intentional wrong-doing'' over the botched financing of her leadership campaign. Her four-month leadership of Labour at Holyrood has been dogged by the row over her acceptance of an illegal campaign contribution from a Jersey-based businessman, a story first broken in the Sunday Herald. Her reputation was further harmed by the revelation that her campaign team actively sought donations under £995, which is £5 below the Electoral Commission's level for public registration. However, her ruse to get past declaring her donors on the Holyrood register of interest - the cash was directed to the" Wendy Alexander Campaign'' not the MSP herself - has been spotted by Dyer, who ordered disclosure.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008

'Meanwhile, the Electoral Commission is continuing to separately investigate an illegal donation to Ms Alexander's leadership campaign.'
BBC Scotland News, 3 rd February 2008.

'This must be end of the road for Wendy Alexander, her short reign as Scottish Labour leader is almost certainly over. Her credibility was damaged enough by the dodgy donations affair. But for parliamentary standards commissioner Dr Jim Dyer to refer her to the procurator fiscal's office for apparently breaking the law takes this controversy to a new level. It is the most extraordinary and dramatic development.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'Scottish Labour's problem is not Wendy Alexander. Scottish Labour's problem is... Scottish Labour. The party that once had a stranglehold has lost its grip and appears to have no idea how to regain it. Whatever the outcome of the Electoral Commission's Donorgate investigation, Alexander's survival as leader is a secondary issue to the party's survival. One veteran politician put it pithily: 'It doesn't matter who is leader if there's nothing worth leading.''
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd February 2008.

'The commissioner believes Ms Alexander may have committed a criminal offence in failing to declare the contributions to a leadership campaign. If the fiscal agrees, the police will be called in to investigate. It really couldn't be worse, and it appears Alexander has been sitting on it since she was informed of the referral by the commissioner's office last Friday. Why didn't she mention this devastating news in any of her media interviews Did she think it might never come out?'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'When Labour's leader is outshone by a dim bulb like Stephen, clearly they have hit rock bottom.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd February 2008.

'Her allies have been insisting that a police investigation needn't require her resignation. That she could fight on and clear her name. But they are whistling in the wind. If she tries to cling on - after Peter Hain had established resignation as the honourable'' course - the press and the public will erupt in indignation. She said that to resign would sacrifice her reputation. But she would have no reputation left to defend.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'When a long-time Labour newspaper like the Daily Record (as I should know) scathingly attacks the party's Scottish leadership, it shows how cack-handed media relations are. Meanwhile, trust in the Holyrood Government has soared by 20% in the seven months since the SNP took control.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd February 2008.

'The party is still in mourning for its loss of power; some constituency parties are virtually moribund; trade unions are disaffected and Labour MPs are appalled by Alexander's joint initiative on the constitution with Tories and Lib Dems. As at least one blood-on-the-walls meeting showed, MSPs and councillors are at odds because, as a leader of a large council told me: 'We have no complaints about the SNP Government - they are giving us the money and the freedom to do what's needed in our areas'.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd February 2008.

'What on earth did Wendy Alexander think she was doing seeking corporate donations for a relatively minor campaign where she was uncontested This wasn't an episode of the West Wing. She wasn't seeking to occupy the Oval Office. She wasn't even seeking to be first minister. She was seeking to be the leader of the largest opposition party in the Scottish Parliament. Nobody stood against her.'
BBC Scotland Political Editor, Brian Taylor, 3 rd February 2008.

'It is not just the Green scandal that has stained the Labour brand since Alexander took over in September. She lost two spin doctors within a month and demanded extra allowances from the public purse.'
Sunday Herald editoral, 3 rd February 2008.

'The effect of Alexander's conduct on Scottish Labour should not be underestimated. Despite being outspent and outmanoeuvred by the SNP at the last election, former Labour leader Jack McConnell lost to the Nationalists by only one vote on a recount. Nine months later, an Alexander-led party is miles behind the SNP and would be slaughtered if an election was called tomorrow.'
Sunday Herald editoral, 3 rd February 2008.

'There is a notably acerbic scene in 'A Man for all Seasons' by Robert Bolt. Sir Thomas More confronts his accuser, Richard Rich, whom he suspects, rightly, of giving evidence against him in return for material advantage. The bold Rich wanted to be richer still as Welsh Attorney General. More says sadly: 'Why, Richard, it profits a man nothing to lose his soul for the whole world . . . but for Wales?' The question for Wendy Alexander may be 'for Jersey ' Or, more comparably, 'for Leader of Labour in the Scottish Parliament?'
BBC Scotland Political Editor, Brian Taylor, 3 rd February 2008.

'Peter Hain resigned to clear his name, suggesting that he could not give enough attention to his parliamentary duties while he was involved in an investigation into his donors. Wendy Alexander should follow his example.'
Sunday Herald editoral, 3 rd February 2008.

'There had been a degree of sympathy building up for Wendy Alexander - dead woman walking - as she awaited the verdict of the electoral commission. But much of that has now evaporated. Wendy is now being seen as a liability, not just to Labour, but to Scottish politics as a whole. Time to put her out of her misery.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'There is a good phrase in Scots Law, it is 'Ignorantia legis neminem excusat' ('Ignorance of the law excuses no one').'
Scott Smith on BBC Scotland, 3 rd February 2008

'I am clear that suggestions that I have been guilty of trying to subvert the law in the registration of donations are completely unfounded. I am also very clear that the Labour Party and Scottish politics would be ill-served by my resignation.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 3 rd February 2008.

'I'm slightly confused. If politicians have to declare gifts to Parliament.... does Alex Salmond have to declare Wendy?'
D, Embra, in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'I really do not know why New Labour people are losing heart here. I mean look at the array of talent ready to take Bendy's place - first off, there's Disney Kerr assuming he can put his own misdemeanours behind him. Then there's Margaret Currant-bun, a star by any standards of Palermo politics. Then there's Jackie Baillie who has given new meaning, even embodiment, to the cliche of 'the elephant in the room' and whose performances on Newsnight have become collectors' pieces. And last but not least, I give you Lord Foulkes, warmonger extraordinaire, who could well be the first fishwife to become leader of the Scottish Labour Party. So why all this doom-and-gloom about losing a Bendy?'
Chris Walker in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander intends to remain as Labour leader in the Scottish Parliament and to fight to clear her name. The longer her leadership is dogged by damaging headlines about donations, the more difficult that becomes.'
Glen Campbell on BBC Scotland, 3 rd February 2008.

'Labour was involved in a second investigation last night after it emerged former health minister Andy Kerr had also been reported to the Crown Office - over an allegation that he failed to declare a £1000 gift. Holyrood Standards Commissioner Dr Jim Dyer - who has already reported Wendy Alexander to the Crown Office - has also declared Kerr may have broken the law.'
James Hamilton in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'Now police are to question the former health minister about hospitality he received from fast food giant McDonald's and which he did not include on the official Register of Interests in breach of the MSPs' Code of Conduct. That failure set in train a four-month investigation by Dyer, who has now decided Kerr may have broken the law. The East Kilbride MSP faces being suspended from the Scottish Parliament or a court fine of £5000.'
James Hamilton in the Sunday Herald, 3 rd February 2008.

'It also emerged that Labour MSP Andy Kerr has been reported to the fiscal, for late registration of hospitality from McDonald's. The former Scottish health minister said he had made a mistake when a declaration he submitted on 7 September, for an event held on the weekend of 3 and 4 August was four days late.'
BBC Scotland News, 3 rd February 2008.

'If Wendy Alexander does go, former health minister Andy Kerr is the frontrunner to take over, but today it emerged that he too is being investigated by the Crown Office, having failed to declare hospitality he received at a football match.'
Ranald Leask on STV News, 3 rd February 2008.

'A colleague was drawn into a parallel gift row with another reference by the Standards Commissioner to the procurator-fiscal. Public services spokesman Andy Kerr admitted 'an error which I regret' when he failed to register £570 in hospitality from the McDonald's food giant within the deadline.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 4 th February 2008.

'Has the former Labour Health Minister, Andy Kerr, had his chips In the latest bizarre twist to Labour's donations scandal, the senior Labour MSP has been reported to the procurator-fiscal by the parliamentary standards commissioner for failing to register a thousand pounds' worth of hospitality from the McDonald's burger chain.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 4 th February 2007.

'The involvement of the fiscal in Ms Alexander's funding case was among the most damaging of the 10 weeks in which her future as leader has hung in the balance. Unusually, it drew her brother Douglas, a close UK cabinet colleague of the Prime Minister, into publicly defending her.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 4 th February 2008.

'It works like this. Complaint is passed to commissioner. Commissioner investigates, independently of parliament and its standards committee. Say, during that investigation, commissioner comes across conduct which 'would, if proved, constitute a criminal offence.' At that point, Dr Dyer must suspend his investigation - and MUST send a report to the fiscal, notifying the committee of his actions. Commissioner's investigation only resumes when the fiscal has finished work: either by concluding criminal proceedings, deciding that no such proceedings are warranted or by giving the Commissioner the green light.'
BBC Scotland political editor Brian Taylor, 4 th February 2008.

'The Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, has refused to resign after it emerged that prosecutors are to launch a new investigation into her failure to declare nearly £10,000 in donations. She brushed off the investigation as a 'distraction', insisting she did nothing wrong.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 4 th February 2008.'

'Alexander admitted on Friday her team began cashing these cheques from August 31 onwards yet they only asked for guidance on the gifts on November 8, nearly 12 weeks after she was officially confirmed as Scottish Labour leader, and only after a furious row broke out over Green's donation. Holyrood's rules give MSPs a month to register all gifts worth more than £530.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 4 th February 2008.'

'Senior Labour politicians are briefing the press that the Electoral Commission has got its legal knickers in a twist over company law and the definition of the word 'donor'. Well, if it doesn't know what a donor is, I don't know who can help it out. Perhaps it should just pack up and hand all this over to McDonald's, who at least know how to deliver on time. By this ruinous prevarication, the Electoral Commission stands accused of a dereliction of its constitutional duty.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 4 th February 2007.

'I'm sorry to say this about my former parliamentary assistant (she wasn't even a member of my family) but wee Wendy Alexander looks like a number which is up now the dread procurator fiscal is looking into her conduct. And all for a contest that never was, running against herself alone for the pitcher of warm spit that is the leadership of Scottish New Labour. Wendy still managed to mess it up.'
George Galloway MP in the Daily Record, 4 th February 2008.

'You couldn't make it up. As you couldn't make up the news that Wendy Alexander's likely successor Andy Kerr (another bantamweight turned super-heavy) has also been reported to the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner for failing to register hospitality he received from McDonald's - not the Gaelic TV equivalent of the Dimbleby brothers but the purveyor of fine meats to the masses. What a whopper.'
George Galloway MP in the Daily Record, 4 th February 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander is accused of breaking the law not once, not twice, but on a number of occasions. She refused to do an interview with STV today.'
Michael Crow on STV News, 4 th February 2008.

'One can only conclude that having godfather Gordon Brown on your side confers a unique immunity to the conventional requirements of honourable parliamentary conduct.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 4 th February 2007.

'I can't give information about the time frames because I was not directly involved.'
Deputy leader of the Labour group in the Scottish Parliament, Cathie Jamieson MSP, 4 th February 2008.

'Asked if the Prime Minister was frustrated that the Electoral Commission was taking as long as it had to investigate Wendy Alexander, the PMS said that issues relating to the Leader of the Labour Party in Scotland were not a matter for him to answer questions on.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 4 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, Scottish Labour's embattled leader, has suffered another blow after it emerged a top aide is to quit. Although Labour officials were last night stressing Tony McElroy had been planning his departure for a while, the timing could hardly be worse for the party's leader. He will be the third spin doctor to leave since Ms Alexander became leader less than five months ago, and news of his departure comes as the Electoral Commission prepares to announce whether they are calling in the police over the illegal donation to Ms Alexander's leadership campaign.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 5 th February 2008.

'Mr McElroy is the third press adviser to leave the Scottish Labour Party since the election. Brian Lironi, the former political editor of the Sunday Mail, was hired as a press spokesman for the parliamentary party but left, apparently after difficulties with Ms Alexander. Matthew Marr, another press spin doctor, then resigned after making a series of drunken outbursts, the most abusive of which were directed at the First Minister, during an awards evening in November.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 5 th February 2008.

'Anybody for a by-election By the end of this week, that's just what we might be faced with. Many people will probably assume that by-election would be for Paisley North. That is Wendy Alexander's constituency, and the Scottish Labour leader is facing an almost feverish level of anticipation that she will be forced out of her job in the next few days. But it is actually more likely that Glasgow Cathcart will provide the first by-election of this parliamentary session because that is the constituency currently held by Labour's Charlie Gordon.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 5 th February 2008.

'It is clear the law has been broken and Ms Alexander was given an illegal donation. The commission can't ignore such a blatant example of law-breaking, but it might not be able to lay the blame entirely on Ms Alexander - and this is where Mr Gordon may find himself taking centre stage.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 5 th February 2008.

'With regard to my role and the investigation process in general, I operate independently of the standards committee and its clerks. The clerks are not under my jurisdiction. Being an independent investigator of complaints is my only role. After investigation, I report to the standards committee or sometimes the prosecution authorities. It is the clerks who answer members' queries about what should be registered. If I require legal advice to assist in interpretation of the law relevant to a complaint, my advice is independent of that available to the clerks or the committee. I am not a final arbiter of what should be counted as a registrable interest. That is a matter for the parliament and, in some cases, the courts. When I investigate a complaint I have, however, to reach a view on whether there may have been a breach of the rules; if such a breach would be an offence, I have to stop investigating and report to the procurator fiscal. I have no discretion in such circumstances.'
Dr J A T Dyer, Scottish parliamentary standards commissioner, Scottish Parliament, 5 th February 2008.

'Sir Kenneth (Collins), who was a Labour member of the European Parliament for 20 years until 1999, reacted angrily to suggestions that his comments about SNP ministers' involvement in this issue had been motivated by political considerations. 'That's utter tripe. This isn't a matter of a plot. It's a matter of making sure that due process is observed,' he said. Nick Kuenssberg, the current deputy chairman of Sepa, was revealed recently as having donated £995 to Wendy Alexander's campaign for the Scottish Labour leadership.'
Daily Telegraph, 5 th February 2008.

'Labour in Scotland - and especially the tiny, progressive wing of the party of which she was once a stalwart - badly needs her to show a sense of moral purpose. The revival of the progressive cause in Scotland requires more than that she should be forced out. Labour has been crippled by sleaze and cronyism. It cannot afford to have the grim, industrial version replaced by a prim, silk-suited variety that buys its handbags in Milan but drinks its sense of morality from the same poisoned well.'
Tim Luckhurst in the Guardian, 5 th February 2008.

'Asked if the Prime Minister was meeting with Wendy Alexander today, the PMS said not as far as he was aware.'
Downing Street Press Briefing, 6 th February 2008.

'First Minister Alex Salmond last night taunted opposition MSPs - by threatening to resign and force a snap election if the SNP government's controversial budget plans are not approved today. He made his move against a backdrop of a Labour Party mired in controversy over Wendy Alexander's donation woes and questionmarks over Liberal Democrat leader Nicol Stephen's handling of the Trump golf resort affair.'
Press & Journal, 6 th February 2008.

'The threat of criminal charges puts further pressure on Ms Alexander to quit as party leader at Holyrood, although she claims she has done nothing wrong. And this week Dr Dyer revealed former Health Minister Kerr, who had been tipped by some as Wendy Alexander's successor, may also have broken the law. If found guilty he could face being suspended from the Scottish Parliament or a court fine of up to £5000.'
East Kilbride News, 6 th February 2008.

'If the budget fell, the (Labour) party would be accused of sabotaging a populist measure to freeze council taxes while provoking a new election it would be very likely to lose. With the Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, facing highly uncomfortable investigations into her finances, the SNP would be likely to win several more seats after taking opinion poll leads of up to 16% in constituency votes following its historic election victory last May.'
Severin Carrell, Scotland correspondent in the Guardian, 6 th February 2008.

'At the weekend, it emerged that Alexander had been reported to Scottish prosecutors by Holyrood's parliamentary standard's commissioner for failing to declare almost £10,000 in gifts to her party leadership election funds last autumn. A further, and potentially far more damaging, investigation by the Electoral Commission into an illegal £950 donation by a Jersey-based businessman is expected to report its findings within days, with the commissioners meeting in London this afternoon.'
Severin Carrell, Scotland correspondent in the Guardian, 6 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has failed the key test of opposition. She is already under significant pressure after being reported to the Electoral Commission and the Fiscal. After today's failure Labour MSPs must ask serious questions about her future as their leader.'
SNP MSP Alex Neil, 6 th February 2008.

'Q: In 2008 - Wendy Alexander escaped from Corton Vale down a ladder with the aid of an accomplice whom she later married.
Was it:
A. A civil partnership with Jackie Ballie
B. Nicol Stephen
C. The Hungry Caterpillar

Q: In 2013 - Who appeared at the independent court of Scotland charged with attempting to help a fugitive escape and outraged the public when he used the 'Romeo defence' that he was merely there to sing sonnets
A. Nicol Stephen
B. Stephen Nicol
C. The Hungry Caterpillar'
414D3220 in the Scotsman, 7 th February 2008.

'Labour proposed a late amendment backing skills training, but without money attached. Independent MSP Margo MacDonald called it 'motherhood and humble pie' - easy for the SNP to accept, yet once their sole amendment was passed, Labour bizarrely abstained. The bewildering saga has damaged Ms Alexander and her finance spokesman, Iain Gray, when things already looked grim for the leadership. The blame game was already under way last night.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'Who could have predicted Annabel Goldie would run rings around Wendy Alexander?'
Scotsman Editorial, 7 th February 2008.

'Labour's behaviour was utterly appalling. This was the Budget. If they agreed with every word of it, then they should have voted for it. And if they did not agree with every word of it, then they should have voted against it. What do Labour MSPs imagine that they are paid for '
David Lindsay in the Guardian, 7 th February 2008.

'Political opponents warned that Labour's baffling voting behaviour cast further shadows over Wendy Alexander, the party's embattled leader, who is still awaiting the judgment of the Electoral Commission on an illegal donation to her leadership election campaign fund. A preoccupied Ms Alexander hurried away from Holyrood, leaving it to her deputies to explain Labour's strange approach to the vote. There were some suggestions Mr Salmond's threat to call an election had frightened Labour off from voting against the Budget, but that was denied by party leaders.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 7 th February 2008.

'Bizarrely, Labour abstained, apart from back-bencher Cathie Craigie, who voted against as she opposed the Budget in principle. Her party said she had made a mistake. The vignette summed up Labour's shambolic performance. It raised anew questions about the ability of Wendy Alexander to lead her party effectively. Having been reported to the procurator fiscal for not recording gifts to her election campaign, and awaiting the outcome of the Electoral Commission investigation into an illegal donation to that campaign, she needed last night like a hole in the head. Mr Swinney, by contrast, gave an accomplished and assured performance yesterday at Holyrood.'
Herald Editorial, 7 th January 2008.

'Last night a number of senior Labour MSPs were privately expressing dismay at the way leader Wendy Alexander handled the opposition to the budget.'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 7 th February 2008.

''It looks daft.' 'Not our finest hour.' 'It's not how I would have handled it.' They were just some of the comments from Labour MSPs last night. Yesterday's budget could be more damaging for Alexander than anything the Electoral Commission have to say about her dodgy donation this week.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 7 th February 2008.

'As the Marks & Spencer television adverts almost say: This wasn't just defeat. This was ritual humiliation. Labour was yesterday - and is on each day that passes - outmanoeuvred, outgunned and outfought on every front and on every issue. Frankly, the official opposition in the Scottish Parliament is beginning to take on all the aspects of a rabble'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 7 th February 2008.

'The approval ratings for Salmond's administration were already high - now they will be stratospheric. The Scottish press has praised Swinney like a football star, and portrayed Labour as a bunch of turnips. The Scottish Labour party as now allowed the first nationalist government in history to consolidate its hold on Scottish politics. It will be much more difficult to dislodge the nats next time.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 8 th February 2008.

'Labour's poor performance over the budget both reflects and compounds the party's current problems. It has yet to come to terms with being ousted from government after eight years in the hotseat, and the sense of powerlessness that brings. And on top of that the party is bogged down by questions over Wendy Alexander's leadership. Whatever the eventual outcome of the long-running saga over dodgy donations to her campaign, there are concerns inside the party over her performance in the post and there are serious doubts about whether she will lead Labour into the Holyrood elections in 2011.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 7 th February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission has concluded its investigation into the acceptance by Wendy Alexander MSP of a donation of £950 from Paul Green, an individual not registered to vote in the UK, and the recording of that donation as having been received from a UK registered company.
The Electoral Commission has decided not to make a report to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.
The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 gives the Electoral Commission power to apply to a court to seek forfeiture of an amount equivalent to any impermissible donation that has been accepted. Wendy Alexander has acknowledged that the donation in question was impermissible, and has voluntarily forfeited this sum. There is therefore no need for the Commission to apply to the courts for a forfeiture order.
The Electoral Commission has also considered the possibility that criminal offences may have been committed in this case. Specifically:
* Under section 56 of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, the offence of accepting and retaining a donation from anyone who is not registered on an electoral register in the UK at the time of the donation. It is also relevant to consider whether all reasonable steps were taken to avoid this; and
* Under section 61 of the Act, any offences of knowingly facilitating, concealing or disguising an impermissible donation and/or knowingly giving false information or withholding information in relation to an impermissible donation. Consideration of these offences also extends in this matter to Wendy Alexanders campaign team.
The Commission has interviewed Wendy Alexander and members of her campaign team and staff, and has obtained and analysed documents.
The Commission has also consulted with the Procurator Fiscal about the scope of its investigation in order to ensure its decision was taken on the basis of all relevant evidence.
In respect of a possible offence under section 56, the Commission has concluded that, while Wendy Alexander did not take all reasonable steps in seeking to comply with the relevant legislation, she did take significant steps. Having considered all the circumstances, the Commission has decided that it is not appropriate or in the public interest to report this matter to the Procurator Fiscal.
In respect of possible offences under section 61, the Commission has concluded that there is not sufficient evidence to establish that an offence has been committed. The Commission has therefore decided that it is not appropriate to report this matter to the Procurator Fiscal.
The conclusions reached by the Commission are the result of its independent judgment, following a thorough investigation. Extraneous considerations such as political or public opinion have played no part in this process, nor have they played any part in the Commission's decision making.
Those standing for party office or, as a members of a campaign team, soliciting or handling donations, have a responsibility to ensure that they understand the requirements of the 2000 Act and the Commission's published guidance. The Commission will continue to monitor compliance with these rules.'
Electoral Commission statement in full, 7 th February 2008.

'Fewer mothers of young children should be sent to jail, according to Scotland's children's commissioner.'
BBC Scotland News, 7 th February 2007.

'In a decision on Thursday, the Electoral Commission said it had decided not to make a report to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. It ruled there was insufficient evidence to pursue any charges.'
Reuters, 7 th February 2008.

'My honesty and integrity have been confirmed by this judgment.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 7 th February 2008.

'You might think that. I couldn't possibly comment.'
Chief Whip the Rt Hon Francis Urquhart MP, in House of Cards by Michael Dobbs.

'This affair has been hugely damaging for Wendy Alexander's leadership of the Labour Party and a part of a pattern of mis-donation across the Labour Party which has been hugely damaging for that institution.'
First Minister the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MP MSP, 7 th January 2008.

'We now have a new Parcel o' Rogues - who were bought and sold for Labour gold.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'The commission also moved to defend its impartiality following intense media interest in the case.'
Political News, 7 th February 2008.

'Election watchdogs have cleared Wendy Alexander of wrongdoing after her Scottish Labour leadership campaign received an illegal donation. The Electoral Commission has decided not to make a report to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.'
BBC Scotland News, 7 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander had admitted breaking the law by accepting a £950 cheque from Jersey-based business Mr Green, despite the fact that non-UK residents are barred from making political donations.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'As recent events have shown, this was the least of Labour's worries. Their handling of the budget was a complete and dismal failure. They were publicly humiliated, and many within Labour's own ranks are now questioning whether they are fit for purpose. Ultimately the Scottish public will cast their verdict.'
Murdo Fraser MSP, Scottish Tory Deputy Leader, 7 th February 2008.

'Today's extraordinary ruling by the Electoral Commission is an invitation to anarchy and risks the break down of the justice system. If you can get away with breaking the law simply because you are the leader of the Labour party in Scotland, then other law breakers will argue that they should also be allowed to escape punishment for their misdemeanours.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission's conclusions underline the lack of transparency and openness which has dogged Labour politicians, including Wendy Alexander, who have faced serious questions about inappropriate or illegal donations. Last week Wendy Alexander attempted, wholly inappropriately, to implicate politicians from other parties in this issue. However, as all the politicians caught up in these allegations are from the Labour Party, the onus is on them to get their house in order.'
Liberal Democrat MSP, Mike Rumbles, 7 th February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission should now be disbanded.'
Alex Porter in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'Alexander admitted last week her team began cashing these cheques from August 31 onwards yet they only asked for guidance on the gifts on November 8, nearly 12 weeks after she was officially confirmed as Scottish labour leader, and only after a furious row broke out over Green's donation.'
Hélène Mulholland in the Guardian, 7 th February 2008.

'Another whitewash, but not entirely unexpected. I don't think that the Electoral Commission has done Alexander any favours. Her own MSPs already believe she is about as much use to them as an ashtray on a motorbike. Politicially speaking, she's dead already. She just doesn't know it yet.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'As a smaller party, entirely reliant on our membership for funding, it's infuriating to see the larger parties vote themselves massive sums of taxpayers' money, take even more money from the super-rich, and then squabble amongst themselves about who is more corrupt. People can see that the current system of scrutiny and regulation is now failing across the board, and the public will surely expect all parties to back clearer rules to try and rebuild confidence in the health of our democracy.'
Scottish Green Party Co-convenor, Robin Harper MSP, 7 th February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission swallows a lot of public money and we should be able to rely on a body of this kind to make sound objective decisions. Perhaps they know something we don't but this hardly inspires confidence in their impartiality.'
Stuart Black in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'She's not out of the woods because there is still the referral to the fiscal from the standards commission, and when these proceedings are all over she's going to have to face the standards committee of this parliament as well.'
SNP MSP Roseanna Cunningham, 7 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has acknowledged that the donation in question was impermissible, and has voluntarily forfeited this sum. There is therefore no need for the commission to apply to the courts for a forfeiture order.'
Electoral Commission, 7 th February 2008.

'According to their website: 'The Electoral Commission is an independent body set up by the UK Parliament. Our aim is integrity and public confidence in the democratic process.' Given that the Electoral Commission has clearly lost public confidence, will its members now resign?'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'The electoral commission in Scotland are effectively hobbled now, how can they possibly refer any politician to the authorities having turned a blind eye to one of the clearest signs of law breaking and attempted coverup we have ever seen.'
George Alexander in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

''There is a complaints procedure: at the Electoral Commission:
'We recognise that individuals and organisations may feel dissatisfied with the way in which we have dealt with a particular matter. Mistakes may be made from time to time which need to be put right. The procedure for making a complaint is explained below. We welcome comments about our performance and service delivery. We regard such complaints as an important way of helping to achieve yet higher standards
I would suggest that everybody who is unhappy about this decision should write to the EC, politely but firmly stating their case.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'No point in dwelling on the electoral commission decision, it was almost certainly inevitable. This isn't a coverup, the essential details are already known, this is simply confirmation of the Unionist establishment's inherent corruption, they have condoned electoral fraud.'
George Alexander in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'As for Wendy Alexander who is guilty of accepting an illegal donation and then not returning it until after she was exposed by a mole, she is a liability. This case clearly shows that some people are above the law! Now the Electoral Commission is tarnished and this whitewash is firmly in the public domain. The SNP government haven't ruled long enough for corruption to be rooted out. The case for a Scottish Electoral Commission has been made today.'
George Laird, The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University, 7 th February 2008.

'The Scottish Unionist establishment have offered what was left of their integrity on a loan of short term gain. That gain is the saving of Wendy Alexander's career and the bolstering of a corrupt Scottish Labour party. The Scottish electorate will determine what the interest on that loan is. I look now forward to it being called in.'
George Alexander in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'Would it not be in the public interest if the names and qualifications of the members of the electoral commission were published. We already know that the Labour peer and donator to Alexander's campaign, Lord Murray Elder is an advisor to the E.C. it would also be nice to know if, in the interest of fairness, he refused to have any part in this affair '
Raibeart Campbeltown in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'When Tony Blair said that Labour were going to be 'whiter than white' little did we know that he was referring to all the whitewash.'
George Alexander in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'She publicly confessed not under duress to commiting an offence. The EC state she did not take reasonable steps... How much clearer must a guilty person be before the Scottish legal system brings about a prosecution This whole saga stinks of corruption from top to bottom. Alexander's statements at the press conference made me wonder should her name be put forward to be made a saint.'
W S Stewart in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'Every time Wendy Alexander speaks everyone will know she escaped justice and she is guilty of breaking the law!
George Laird in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'The once-dominant Labour Party is out of power. Its leader in the Scottish Parliament, Wendy Alexander, is mired in two investigations into party donations and unable to oppose the SNP effectively. Although it has only a minority of parliamentary seats, the SNP has reigned pretty much unchecked since coming to power in May.'
The Economist, 7 th February 2008.

'This verdict is very much a gift to the SNP government. Wendy Alexander can limp on in disgrace until either she is forced out, the mole/moles get another chance or she lines up a Mandelson style appointment. The issue is of trust, that is totally gone, she will continue to pull down the Labour Party and that puts the jobs and family security of Labour MSP's at risk. Her party is very openly split because of her and there is no upside for her either in the short or long term.'
George Laird, Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University, 7 th February 2008.

'I deeply regret that my campaign accepted a £950 donation, which it transpired was in breach of the rules, and I apologise, again, to my colleagues, my party and the public.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 7 th February 2008.

'Wendy's team admits that the donation broke the law. Either the donation solicited itself, banked itself, thanked itself, then forfeited itself, or it had help.'
Observer in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander won a temporary respite from the troubles besetting her as Scottish Labour leader when she avoided criminal prosecution over an admitted illegal donation to her leadership campaign.'
Angus Macleod in the Times, 7 th February 2008.

'Asked if the Prime Minister had any words of congratulations to Wendy Alexander regarding not being prosecuted by police, the Prime Minister's Spokesman (PMS) said that this was a Labour Party matter.'
Downing Street press briefing, 7 th February 2008.'

'Must confess that sounded a bit like 'not proven' to me.'
BBC Scotland political editor Brian Taylor, 7 th February 2008.

'At the end Wendy Alexander sought reassurance from a colleague. Asking Jackie Baillie MSP 'Was that OK?', she was told: 'That was ******* fabulous.' The latest in a long line of politicians to forget the dangers of an open mic.'
David Cowan, STV news, 7 th February 2008.

'Ah Jackie Baillie, not only a vision of loveliness to behold, but with a mouthful of gentle spring waterfalls too. Charming.'
John J. Sheridan in the Herald, 7 th February 2008.

'If she had wanted to remove me from office she had a perfect opportunity yesterday. I can only suppose, because of the Labour Party's almost unanimous abstention in the Budget, that you want me to continue in office. In the new mood of consensus, let me say - I want Wendy Alexander to continue in office as well.'
First Minister the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MP MSP, 7 th February 2008.

'So battered and bruised, Wendy Alexander lives to fight another day. The question is: how much lasting damage has this done to her leadership?'
David Cowan, STV news, 7 th February 2008.

'Has it damaged Labour? Yes. Quite simply, yes.'
BBC Scotland political editor Brian Taylor, 7 th February 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander has escaped prosecution for accepting an illegal donation to her leadership campaign.'
Steve Bargeton, political editor, in the Courier, 8 th February 2008.

'How could this be regarded as a sane or a sensible decision when Wendy herself admitted she had broken the law If you break the law you have to take the consequences.'
SNP MSP Alex Neil, 8 th February 2008.

'As well as the decision not to report Ms Alexander over the illegal donation, the commission's two-month investigation also failed to uncover 'sufficient evidence' that her campaign team attempted to hide the fact that they had accepted £950 from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green, despite the fact that as a non-UK resident he is banned from making political donations.'
Paul Schofield in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander will not be reported to police over her dodgy donation, watchdogs ruled yesterday. The Electoral Commission found she broke the rules but said it was 'not appropriate or in the public interest' to call in prosecutors. The ruling was slammed as a 'whitewash' and a 'not proven verdict after a guilty plea' by SNP MSPs. Tories piled more pressure on her struggling leadership, claiming the scandal was 'the least of her worries.''
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 8 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander herself seemed to favour 'vindicated' which I find a bizarre word to use in connection with and admitted breach of the law. She also referred repeatedly to her being 'cleared' by the commission, a word which of course appears nowhere in their finding.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'We are in the absolutely crazy situation where the law has been broken and nothing has been done about it.'
SNP MSP Alex Neil, 8 th February 2008.

'I'm going on a shoplifting spree this weekend. If I get caught I shall say I did not intentionally walk out the shop so I am therefore not guilty! It's the best defence you know!'
Alias 'Wendy' in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Labour still faces investigations into its funding last year, including the £103,000 taken by Peter Hain and £650,000 it received in concealed donations from the property developer David Abrahams. Alexander has been reported to prosecutors by the Scottish parliamentary standards commissioner for failing to declare to Holyrood nearly £10,000 in gifts to her leadership campaign, including the £950 from Green.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 8 th February 2008.

'The Herald revealed in November how Ms Alexander's campaign team had accepted Mr Green's money, but that it has been registered in the name of the Glasgow-based firm Combined Property Services. The money was solicited by Charles Gordon, the Glasgow Cathcart MSP, who was forced to resign as Labour's transport spokesman at Holyrood after it was confirmed that the donation broke electoral law.'
Paul Schofield in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander's political career had been in jeopardy since she admitted in November last year that she had accepted an illegal donation of £950 from a Jersey-based businessman during her leadership campaign.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander didn't even try to hide her delight at yesterday's decision and handled herself pretty well at a packed press conference. One of her supporters got a bit carried away and described her leader's performance - in a statement that was picked up by an STV microphone - as: 'F***ing magic.' That may be what her pals were saying about her performance yesterday, but given the dire state of her party at Holyrood the jury is still very much out on her overall leadership. On that front, she has a lot to prove.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 8 th February 2008.

'The real tragedy of the EC's decision is what it says about integrity, in the UK, today. The Law, by the admission of Ms Alexander and, particularly, Mr. Gordon, was broken to the extent of, conspiracy to commit fraud; misleading information about the donor: a retraction of the statement made publicly and, a letter of thanks to the donor, in Jersey, weeks after the statutary declaration should have been made. The EC decided that these facts were not sufficient for referal to the PF. What weight of evidence does the EC require Worse, L&B police have said that they will, now, not pursue the complaint by a member of the public. Why On the evidence in the public domain; particularly, the statements of Mr. Gordon there would seem to be a prima face case. Is our system so corrupt?'
Frank McBride in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'I think coming on top of the Scottish election fiasco last year, the credibility of the Electoral Commission is in total tatters.'
SNP MSP Alex Neil, 8 th February 2008.

'Alexander still faces a possible police inquiry over the donation after Holyrood's in-house sleaze watchdog reported her to the fiscal. The Commission are still probing a donation Green made to Glasgow South Labour Party - used to fight Gordon's election campaign. The row has added to Alexander's difficulties as party leader. She has failed to get the better of Alex Salmond, while some of her initiatives have been questioned by Labour MPs and councillors.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 8 th February 2008.

'Mr Gordon later admitted accepting another cheque for £950 from Mr Green in the run-up to last year's Holyrood elections. Last night, the Electoral Commission revealed they were seeking forfeiture of the cash from the Glasgow South Labour Party.'
Paul Schofield in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Any party where the likes of Jackie Baillie can be considered a bit hitter needs therapy.'
Sergeant Fox in the Guardian, 8 th February 2008.

'So if I am caught speeding in my car, I can claim I took 'significant steps' to obey the speed limit but not 'all reasonable steps' and the courts are bound to exonerate me, even if I freely admit breaking the law. After all, a precedent has now been set.'
BM, Glasgow in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'She still has to wait for the procurator-fiscal's ruling over her failure to report her campaign donations to the Holyrood register of members' interests, and she is also likely to face a standards committee investigation.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'The decision of the Electoral Commission yesterday not to report Wendy Alexander to the procurator fiscal over an illegal donation from the Jersey-based businessman Paul Green is not quite the blanket exoneration which the Scottish Labour leader subsequently presented the ruling as. For a start, the commission found Ms Alexander had not taken all reasonable steps to comply with the law on donations from people not on the UK electoral register (she had taken 'significant' steps). Also, on the matter of whether an impermissible donation had been deliberately concealed, it concluded there was not sufficient evidence to establish an offence had been committed.'
Herald editorial, 8 th February 2008.

'I do most genuinely and fervently hope that none of you who think this so amusing and that Wendy has done so well, ever has cause to need the judiciary to rule against someone who transgresses against you or yours. Because all that has happened here so far is that a basic tenet of the law has been ignored.'
John J. Sheridan in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Duncan McNeil, the Labour whip, was just trying to be helpful. Unfortunately, it didn't quite work out that way. Intervening to prevent Wendy Alexander from having to answer questions about her damaged standing in the party, Mr McNeil declared: 'There has been relatively little back-stabbing about this.' The party line has always been to present a united front but, in one moment, Mr McNeil ripped that to pieces and conceded at least a small level of serious discontent within the party about Ms Alexander's leadership.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander does not emerge from this looking whiter than white, or with her reputation restored as a politician capable of effective leadership.'
Herald editorial, 8 th February 2008.

'Before yesterday the score was Scottish Press 2 Scottish Politicians 0. Following the forced resignations - forced, that is, by the Fourth Estate - of Henry McLeish, the second First Minister, and David McLetchie, the first leader of the Scottish Tories, there was a clear determination on the part of Wendy Alexander not to give the hacks a hat-trick of scalps. And so, as of last night, the score wasn't 3-0 but 2-1; never forgetting, however, that the hacks haven't finished with Ms Alexander yet. Not by a long chalk.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 8 th February 2008.

'There have been many instances over the years of these people trying it on with the electorate with their arrogant assumptions that people are too stupid or apathetic to do anything about them but this surely must be the last straw for most people. One law for Wendy and one law for the rest of us! 'Technical breaches' of the law! It really does beggar belief!'
Alex Brodie in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Then there are her parliamentary performances, particularly the extraordinary decision two days ago to table a weak amendment and then to abstain on a Budget which the party had opposed for three months. This decision, and the fallout which resulted in a deluge of criticism for Labour, has caused resentment among Labour MSPs.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander became leader of the Scottish Labour party last September after winning the post uncontested. The commission began an investigation into the illegal donation from Jersey in November. Although Ms Alexander has been cleared, her position as leader suffered a blow on Wednesday when the ruling Scottish National party secured parliamentary approval for its budget, thanks to the votes of Conservative MSPs. Although Labour had said it opposed the budget, its MSPs abstained in the vote.'
James Buxton in the Financial Times, 8 th February 2008.

'A rap on the knuckles from the commissioner must have been preferable to the bruising encounter endured after Labour's shocking performance on Wednesday during the vote on the Scottish Government's Budget. She has had a torrid time as Scottish Labour leader. Is this because she was dogged and distracted by the fallout from the donations Or has that affair merely masked the fact that she does not have what it takes to lead a political party Time and events will tell.'
Herald editorial, 8 th February 2008.

'Hence we have millionaires donating, dodgily or otherwise to their party of choice, and Peter Hain spending thousands on his bid to be Labour's Deputy Leader. To a smaller extent same applies to Wendy Alexander, even though she was the sole candidate. So why the begging bowl So Wendy's been exonerated - but no touting would have meant no inquiry would have been required.'
Joan Burnie in the Daily Record, 8 th February 2008.

'The electoral comission might as well resign, assuming they are there to give credibility to elections standards. If they are there to protect their pals from the law they are doing a grand job. Shameless!'
Jo Mellon in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Next time I indvertently break the law I must employ the defence used by Ms Alexander; essentially I didnae know / it wasnae me. Pathetic! The law was broken, Labour admit the law was broken. If this was a normal person it would end in a prosecution, not a stiff talking to that seems to be the outcome here!'
Patrick Kirkwood in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'It is clear that Ms Alexander has to improve her parliamentary approach, not just in key voting decisions, but in her contributions at First Minister's questions, where she has been consistently poorer than Nicol Stephen, the Scottish Liberal Democrat leader.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander fools nobody, probably not even herself, by claiming that the decision not to refer the illegal £950 donation to her Scottish Labour Party leadership campaign to the country's prosecutors was a vindication of her actions.'
Press & Journal Editorial, 8 th February 2008.

'On the same day Alexander is 'cleared' by the EC down here in the local press a young single mum (one of the plebs you know what I mean) who was claiming housing benefit and delayed telling the local authority her hours of work had increased appeared in court and was found guilty of fraudulently claiming benefit. Court didn't accept she took significant steps to inform the council in time so she has been found guilty and must repay the money along with community service. Yes the class system is alive and kicking.'
Seumas, Irvine in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'At times shrill and restless, at others seemingly calm and in control, this was a political leader determined to keep her head above water. The public, she said, actually quite liked it when a politician admitted their own mistakes. What a shame then, that she never quite got round to saying sorry.'
Emma Cowling in the Scotsman, 8 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, Labour's lost-looking Scottish leader, seems to have a growing reputation for just talking a lot of hot air. This was confirmed by Bill Copeland, who was speaking at a dinner in Duffy's pub in Perth the other day, and noticed written next to the toilet's hand-drier: 'Press to hear a few words from Wendy Alexander'.'
Ken Smith in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'On the face of it, and as this column said at the outset, there were compelling reasons for Ms Alexander handing in her badge and heading back to the West End of Glasgow to spend more time with her family. However, she decided to tough it out, face the flak and offer one piece of seemingly improbable defence after another. By far the most implausible was that whatever she may or not have done and whether or not it was illegal, unlawful or impermissible, she hadn't done any of it - whatever it was - 'intentionally'. It was like saying: 'I may have been doing more 30 mph in a built-up area, officer, but I didn't mean to and so could you please put that speeding ticket away?''
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 8 th February 2008.

'And we admire the apparent cleverness of East Kilbride Labour MSP Andy Kerr, who is tipped to take over from Wendy, despite the fact that he forgot to mention some hospitality from burger chain McDonald's while Health Minister. He is quoted in the East Kilbride News denying that he would stand against Wendy. Says Andy: 'Wendy Alexander has, and will continue to have, my support. But as soon as you deny the story it gives it credence and legs.' Andy added: 'I repeat again, there is absolutely no truth in it.' Quite.'
Ken Smith in the Herald, 8 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's worries with the Electoral Commission were not her biggest headache. Labour is just not fit for purpose at present. There are undoubtedly huge challenges ahead of her.'
Scottish Tory leader, Annabel Goldie MSP, 8 th Febriary 2008.

'The body which cleared Wendy Alexander over the illegal donation to her campaign was today accused of a whitewash.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 8 th February 2008.

'However, the ruling does not mean Ms Alexander is completely in the clear. The Scottish Parliament's standards commissioner, Jim Dyer, last week reported her to the fiscal for allegedly failing to declare donations on the register of members' interests.'
Press & Journal, 8 th February 2008.

'During the long weeks, Alexander's jacket has been hanging on a shoogly nail. The big question has been, who will succeed her Who can take the party in a new direction The answer so far is no one.'
Lesley Riddoch in the Guardian, 8 th February 2008.

'The reality is that, for all her bluster, Wendy Alexander broke the law by accepting a donation from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green. In many other walks of life, her explanation that the donations to her campaign were being handled by her management team would not hold water. By way of analogy, a motorist caught driving without insurance would receive short shrift from the legal system if he claimed that it was someone else's job to renew the policy, and that person had failed so to do. The rule of strict liability applies to many areas of the law, but not, apparently, to dodgy donations to political causes.'
Press & Journal Editorial, 8 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was under pressure last night to publish correspondence which she has previously claimed would clear her of any wrongdoing in the illegal donation row.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 9 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander and her colleagues know their problems have not gone away - they are just not going to get any worse immediately. Even before the donations row blew up there were mutterings about Ms Alexander's leadership. Her performances against Alex Salmond at First Minister's Questions were poor. And there was little sign of Labour making the much-needed recovery from their election defeat. The threat of possible court action over donations may now have been all but lifted, but the episode has left Ms Alexander and her party badly damaged.'
Evening News editorial, 10 th February 2008.

'Now, what of the advice itself On Newsnight (4th February), two MSPs, Mike Rumbles and Roseanna Cunningham revealed that clerks of the Standards Committee always give the same advice on donations: if in doubt, declare it. Jackie Baillie MSP, however, claimed that e-mail exchanges between Wendy Alexander and a clerk of the Standards Committee had been published telling a different tale. There is no trace of them in the public domain.'
Thomas McLaughlin in the Herald, 9 th Febriary 2008.

'So as the cash-for-honours brouhaha dies down, it transpires Wendy Alexander is 'owed an apology.' She can expect it the minute she tracks down her personal stylist.'
John Mckie in the Daily Record, 9 th February 2008.

'Thank you, Wendy Alexander and the Electoral Commission, for providing an exciting new dimension to the interpretation of the law. For instance, when writing to escape a speeding fine and penalty points: I am terribly, terribly sorry for failing to observe the 40mph limit sign when understandably distracted by tailgating but I can say with transparent honesty that there was no intentional wrongdoing. If it is good enough for our elected representatives, it should be good enough for the rest of us.'
Shiela Bain in the Herald, 9 th February 2008.

'The sadness here is that, in not coming clean at once, saying: 'I made a mistake, report me and, if I am fined, let me pay my fine as an honest woman,' Ms Alexander has lost a deal of moral authority. Sometimes it is right to admit you were wrong, and wrong to overstrive to claim you were 'really' right. As Pyrrhus would tell you, some 'victories' are not worth having. As Pyrrhus said: 'One more such victory would utterly undo me' - or even Alexander.'
Professor Ian Brown in the Herald, 9 th February 2008.

'Gordon Brown has delivered another blow to Wendy Alexander's Labour leadership by downgrading and seizing control of her plan to boost Holyrood's powers. The prime minister has made it clear Alexander's proposal for a Constitutional Commission should be reduced to either a review 'or a working party''.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'You have to look the part as well, goddammit. I never had my hair highlighted in my life before. Whatever this is, it's not a gravy train.'
Wendy Alexander MSP, 10 th February 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander last night admitted she had presided over a 'fiasco' in the row over her campaign donations.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'Alexander's Labour leadership is in serious trouble after she broke the law by accepting an illegal £950 donation from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green. The Paisley North MSP, who has endured two months of torment after the Sunday Herald broke the donations story, has tried to recapture the domestic agenda by backing a Constitutional Commission to increase Holyrood's powers.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'It emerged last night that Alexander has effectively been put on a year's probation by senior party figures, who warned she had until the 2009 European elections to prove her leadership credentials.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission's ruling does nothing to clear up the central question in the whole sorry story: why was the Green donation listed in the Alexander campaign's submission of donations as coming from a Glasgow-based company called Combined Property Services (CPS)?'
Sunday Herald editorial, 10 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander still faces possible prosecution after a second complaint - from Standards Commissioner Jim Dyer that the Labour leader failed to declare her donations - was reported to the fiscal last week.'
Vic Roderick in the Sunday Express, 10 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader, is facing an investigation by the Electoral Commission into a claim that she channelled £12,000 through a Labour front organisation to fund her constituency office. The police have also been asked to investigate. The development put her under renewed pressure just days after the commission had ruled that it was not in the public interest to report her to police over a £950 illegal donation from Paul Green, a Jersey-based businessman, to her 2007 campaign for the party leadership.'
Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 10 th February 2008.

'The decision not to report Ms Alexander was taken despite her leadership campaign manager, Tom McCabe, admitting in November the law had been broken. Leaked documents showing details of the donations were published and Ms Alexander herself confessed on Newsnight Scotland last week that the funding was illegal.'
Vic Roderick in the Sunday Express, 10 th February 2008.

'Sir Alistair Graham, former chairman of the Commons committee on standards in public life, said that if the allegations were true she should consider resigning. 'It is fairly fraudulent to invite people as a paying guest to discuss one subject, when the real purpose is to collect money for a political party,' he said.'
Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 10 th February 2008.

'Beleagured Wendy Alexander is facing the prospect of a highly damaging public prosecution over the illegal donations row that threatens to end her career. The Scottish Sunday Express can reveal a disillusioned pensioner is seeking funds to try and haul the Labour leader before a court. Bill Sinclair, 73, plans to apply to the Scottish Legal Aid Board for financial assistance this week after the Electoral Commission decided not to report Ms Alexander to the procurator fiscal over the £950 donation to her leadership campaign from Jersey-based businessman, Paul Green. He is also preparing to make a formal complaint to the European Ombudsman within days, accusing the Commission of incompetence and maladministration over its handling of the row.'
Vic Roderick in the Sunday Express, 10 th February 2008.

'Why aren't these alleged breaches of criminal law simply investigated by the police Why do we have the Electoral Commission acting as a kind of buffer zone between politicians and the criminal justice system No other citizens of this country enjoy such a privilege. Why should our political masters?'
Kenny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's supporters have planned another orchestrated 'ring- round' to the media in a desperate bid to prop up her flagging leadership. A leaked Shadow Cabinet minute has declared that the widely ridiculed tactic of reading a pre-prepared 'loyalty script' to selected journalists has been 'successful'. Now a new script has been prepared in which her MSPs will read out typed notes on why Labour did not support the SNP's budget.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'Mark Hirst, a political researcher at the Scottish Parliament who reported Ms Alexander to Strathclyde's Chief Constable in November, is now referring the force's failure to investigate to the Police Complaints Commissioner.'
Vic Roderick in the Sunday Express, 10 th February 2008.

'The wider question, now, is whether Alexander's vindication marks a new beginning for Labour in Scotland. Labour are hoping they've reached bottom, and that the only way from here is up. In their dreams.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'Whoever is advising Wendy Alexander should tell her a bit of humility would be in order. She could have found herself in the dock had the Electoral Commission not cleared her over the dodgy donation. Instead of being humble, she was strutting, bullish and arrogant. And a huge turn-off for voters. Even worse, Alex Salmond is wiping the floor with her in Holyrood.'
Anna Smith in the Sunday Mirror, 10 th February 2008.

'Alexander's role in all this can be gauged by the fact that she wasn't even present at this crucial Downing Street confab between the Scottish secretary, the chancellor and the PM. This is the way Gordon Brown has always operated. He hasn't been called the Godfather of Scottish politics for nothing.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'Alexander's comments come with senior party figures warning that she has until next year's European elections to prove that she is capable of leading the party in Scotland over the long-term. A senior party source said: 'If she can demonstrate leadership she has got until the European elections next year'.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'When Alexander said that the donations affair was a 'distraction' from 'real' politics, she was right - though for the wrong reasons. The Electoral Commission's belated verdict last week diverted attention from the tirade of criticism the Labour leader was receiving for her handling of the budget vote in parliament.'Humiliation', 'shambles', 'mince' was the verdict of the Scottish press in one of the most sustained assaults on a leader's competence that I can remember.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'Several other party sources contacted by Scotland on Sunday said they believed she had no future at all. 'She is toast,' said one well-placed insider.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'Her repertoire of facial tics is a gift to photographers, and newspapers have taken to running collages of Alexander's faces revealing the full range of her contortions. There is a particularly damaging video on YouTube, in which some unkind soul has edited one of her interviews with Glenn Campbell, cutting her words and leaving only her grimaces.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'Alexander has broken a few taboos. She has also admitted breaking the rules with regard to political donations.'
Catherine Deveney in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'Last week also demonstrated that this SNP administration is not an overnight affair but an accomplished government that will be hard to dislodge. Alexander's challenge is to find some political answer to this. She needs to discover some wit at First Minister's Questions; develop a coherent critique of progressive nationalism; make progress on reforming the UK constitution; and invent a distinctive set of domestic policies. But above all, she needs to demonstrate that she is the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland, and has the authority to take her party in a radically different direction. She's got some breathing space - until the European election next year - to get her act together. If she has one.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 10 th February 2008.

'But is she the right person for the job Alexander insists she is but however upbeat she appears, she must be very well aware that the L plates are still on her leadership car. She has yet to prove that she is capable of passing her test.'
Catherine Deveney in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'With little chance of finding out more about the donations saga, attentions will once again turn to the Labour Party's performance in Holyrood. Unfortunately, the picture there is hardly less dismal. The botched response to the SNP's budget last week casts serious doubts on the ability of the Labour team to offer an effective opposition to an SNP government enjoying almost unprecedented public support and certainly displaying a chutzpah not seen before in the Scottish parliament.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 10 th February 2008.

'Money laundering is the process by which dodgy money is made legal by putting it through a legitimate business. The grubbiness is washed away and the laundered cash is left spotlessly clean in the eyes of the law. There's no easy way of saying this, so here goes: Wendy Alexander is, I believe, guilty of a form of political money laundering. And she has been allowed to get away with it.'
Kenny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'Alexander's biggest problem remains with Labour MPs, who are incandescent about her plans to increase Holyrood's powers via the creation of a cross-party Constitutional Commission. The leaked account of a Downing Street summit on the issue is devastating for Alexander. Not only does the prime minister believe the body should not be called a commission - he favours 'working party' or 'review' - but he wants the UK government, not the Scottish parliament, to take the lead.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 10 th February 2008.

'The verdict on Alexander last week was that she had somehow inadvertently and unintentionally broken the law - that she was somehow an innocent in all this. I think that's being overly kind. Alexander knew Green was her benefactor - she signed a letter of thanks addressed to his Jersey home. She was presumably happy with the idea that a UK company could be used as a conduit for someone who was barred from giving her money directly. (In fact, unbeknown to her, the donation actually came in the form of a personal cheque from Green himself.) To me, it looks a lot like an attempt to play smart with a law that is intended to keep politics clean and above-board.'
Kenny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'The questions the Electoral Commission should have asked are:
1: Why, if Wendy Alexander queried the Paul Green donation on October 5, did she push ahead with sending a thank you note to the tax exile's home address in Jersey?
2: When was Wendy Alexander first told that Green's contribution came from a company called Combined Property Services, and who told her?
3. Alexander's statement on Thursday claimed she asked her team to 'seek' legal clarity on the donation after she queried it on October 5. Was this clarity ever sought and, if so, by whom?
4. Why did Team Alexander register the donation in the name of CPS on November 7 when their own donations list, dated November 5, stated that the address to be given to the commission was Green's home residence in Jersey?'
Sunday Herald editorial, 10 th February 2008.

'As for Wendy Alexander, she insists she is now in the clear. Not so. Today in an interview with this newspaper she begins the process of trying to claw back some political credibility. I seriously wonder if it's possible. Her donations scandal leaves a sour taste that no amount of sweet-talking can disguise.'
Kennny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 10 th February 2008.

'How many Courier readers had their breakfast spoiled the other morning by the sight of Wendy Alexander's smug countenance staring out at them from the front page, accompanied by the news that she had escaped prosecution although law breaking had occurred and this had been admitted at the outset by her colleague Tom McCabe.'
James Smith in the Courier, 11 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander received £12,000 from the Scottish Industry Forum (SIF), which organised the two 'Renfrewshire Renaissance' events in 2002. Labour yesterday stressed the money was declared with both the parliamentary authorities and the Electoral Commission and insisted the party's links with the SIF were well-known. But some of those who attended the events, including Conservative and SNP supporters, said they were unaware the money raised was destined for Labour coffers.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 11 th February 2008.

'What trust can the public feel in the Electoral Commission abilities to regulate the behaviour of politicians when it has produced this whitewash This is a black day in Scottish politics and must never be repeated.'
Jim Bryce in the Scotsman, 11 th February 2008.

'With John Reid gone and Wendy Alexander slipping away, I have only two former employees left in the upper reaches of government and New Labour.'
George Galloway in the Daily Record, 11 th February 2008.

'The photograph on the front page of The Courier, February 8, perfectly summed up the arrogance of Wendy Alexander. No trace of remorse or apology, but the self-satisfied smirk of someone who has had her snout in the trough and has 'got away with it'.'
Scott Cunningham in the Courier, 11 th February 2008.

'There was further bad news for Ms Alexander yesterday with reports that the Scottish Labour leader may face a new Electoral Commission investigation into claims that £12,000 was raised for one of her election campaigns from a front organisation. Two dinners were held by an organisation called the Scottish Industry Forum in 2002. After that, money from the foundation went to Ms Alexander's constituency office for her 2003 election campaign.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 11 th February 2008.

'I was fascinated to discover that Wendy Alexander reflects on Buddhist philosophy before going into battle in Holyrood. It seems that this gives her solace in the sordid and heartless world of Scottish politics. Perhaps she should deliver a resonant 'Ommm' at First Minister's Questions - it would certainly put Alex Salmond off his stride.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 11 th February 2008.

'Those who watched Newsnight Scotland (7 February) would have seen a remarkable performance by Gordon Brewer whose incisive interrogation of Wendy Alexander completely demolished her contention that the decision by the Electoral Commission completely vindicated her. Clearly, we now have our own Jeremy Paxman here in Scotland. Indeed, his performances are invariably superior to those of his southern colleague. Well done BBC Scotland.'
John Sutherland in the Scotsman, 11 th February 2008.

'It used to be said that there was one law for the rich and one for the poor. Today, it seems, that there is one law for MPs and MSPs, and one for the rest of us. Wendy Alexander's not proven verdict from the Electoral Commission is just the latest example of politicians getting away with breaking the letter or the spirit of the law and feigning innocence.'
Iain D. Mann in the Herald, 11 th February 2008.

'There's no doubt that Ms Alexander and the senior members of her team are under pressure from Downing Street for their failure to provide a coherent or competent opposition to the Scottish Government. The dismal performance of Ms Alexander and her shadow team at the budget debate is simply the latest example of this failure.'
Andrew Sharp in the Scotsman, 12 th February 2008.

'After Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander's dodgy financial donations, reader Jim Waugh in Germany notices on the website of website designer Streamline that it has given Wendy's fellow Glasgow Labour MSP Paul Martin not money, but a free Xbox 360 video game console as a thank-you for letting them design his website. We wonder if Paul plays the biggest selling Xbox game, Halo 3, in which you become the Master Chief, a cybernetically-enhanced supersoldier, waging war against alien races. And does he picture SNP leader Alex Salmond, or perhaps even Wendy, as he blasts away at the aliens?'
Ken Smith in the Herald, 12 th February 2008.

'A couple of weeks ago, Wendy Alexander held a dinner for some members of the Holyrood political press corps. Her aim was to explain her thinking on the constitutional convention but, in the course of the evening, the Scottish Labour leader was told - quite bluntly - that she was pretty awful at First Minister's Questions.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 12 th February 2008.

'What also looks like the truth is that while Messrs Brown, Darling and Browne may sound like a nice respectable firm of country solicitors they will in fact give the Wendy Commission all the support it needs, provided it doesn't ever look like doing anything. They can't shoot it down too early for two reasons. The first is that given the trouble Ms Alexander's been in lately, being whacked by her own side over her pet project at this juncture wouldn't really do Labour's chances in Scotland much good.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 12 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander may well reckon that her 'not proven' verdict last week from the Electoral Commission was an end to her troubles. But the news that Gordon Brown, a man she reckons is a friend as well as a colleague, is set to undermine both her and the project that she thinks can rescue her beleaguered leadership, will be an especially bitter blow.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 12 th February 2008.

'Labour's hangover from last May continues to unbalance the party and Wendy Alexander, in the midst of her woes, has joined her Unionist colleagues at Holyrood to create the constitutional commission whose raison d'etre appears to be considering how many more powers the Scottish Parliament should have to create a bulwark against the advance of the SNP. A chill has run down Westminster's spine at this and Mr Cairns's less-than-enthusiastic response was self-evident.'
Michael Settle in the Herald, 12 th February 2008.

'His (Scotland Office Minister, David Cairns) MP intervention will ruffle feathers north of the border, particularly those of Wendy Alexander, the party's beleaguered leader in Scotland, who is a driving force behind the Scottish Constitutional Commission, which brings together the three major unionist parties.'
Michael Settle in the Herald, 12 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander: The fate of Labour's leader in Scotland hangs in the balance amid allegations of an illegal donation.'
Tanya Thompson and Martyn McLaughlin in the Scotsman, 13 th February 2008.

'We know from the meeting they had on Jan 28, and which this column has confirmed, that the Prime Minister, Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, and Des Browne, the Scottish Secretary, will only help Ms Alexander if she scales down drastically both her involvement in the new body and calls it something meaningless, like a 'working party' or 'review group'.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 13 th February 2008.

'A senior figure in Wendy Alexander's back-room team yesterday accused Scotland Office Minister David Cairns of being 'out of step' with Labour members north of the Border after he dismissed calls for Holyrood to be given greater financial powers.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 13 th February 2008.

'There are only two possible explanations. Either Ms Alexander's advisers are not doing their jobs properly and they are failing to tell her when she is not doing well. Or they are pointing out her shortcomings, but she is failing to take any notice.'
Hamish MacDonell in the Scotsman, 13 th February 2008.

'Mr Cairns, MP for Inverclyde, said the Scottish Labour, Lib Dem and Conservative-backed Scottish Constitutional Commission was 'inward-looking', despite an assertion from Ms Alexander that Prime Minister Gordon Brown supported it.'
Press & Journal, 13 th February 2008.

'As we said at the outset, all those who think that devolution has gone far enough will not be sorry that Mr Brown and his senior colleagues are beginning to pull the rug from under the feet of their Holyrood colleagues. It's just that having led them up the garden path for so long now, it's a pity that Mr Brown couldn't have let down Ms Alexander, who's a friend after all, a bit more gently. Instead of that the whole thing is taking on the appearance of a blood sport. Labour in Scotland were last night still clinging fondly to the notion that the Wendy Commission, as originally envisaged, was still alive and kicking. If so, then they probably believe in Santa Claus, too.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 13 th February 2008.

'With the likes of Wendy Alexander, Peter Hain, Derek Conway and Harriet Harman mired in allegations of impropriety in recent weeks, it seems scandal continues to chip away at the public's desire to enter public service, destroying trust in politicians and our faith in democracy.'
Tanya Thompson and Martyn McLaughlin in the Scotsman, 13 th February 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander warned of a 'swathe of cuts' to organisations across Scotland. But Pat Watters, president of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla), said voluntary bodies need not suffer unduly. He said the financial settlement was tight but stressed that services were not being cut.'
BBC Scotland News, 13 th February 2008.

'Labour in Scotland was on the brink of civil war last night after a senior MP launched an outspoken attack on Wendy Alexander's calls for Holyrood to be given more powers. The MP, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there was 'hostility' at Westminster to Ms Alexander's Scottish Constitutional Commission - and predicted that its recommendations would be rejected by the House of Commons. In a further blow to Ms Alexander, a leading Labour councillor yesterday denied her claims that voluntary groups face massive funding cuts. The deep divisions within the party were exposed as Labour MPs, MSPs and councillors prepare to meet for talks in Glasgow tomorrow.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 14 th February 2008.

'I am grateful to Lord Murray Elder for setting the record straight about his having no involvement in the recent Wendy Alexander inquiry, having resigned from the parliamentary advisory group before last December. I presume he resigned the day he sent Ms Alexander a personal donation to her campaign fund Lord Elder may not know that the Electoral Commission website, updated in January 2008 and which I checked before writing my earlier letter, still lists him as a member of this group. But I'm sure this misinformation is not intentional wrongdoing.'
Iain D. Mann in the Herald, 14 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander has been attempting to get back on the front foot in recent days following the Electoral Commission's decision last week not to call in the police over an illegal donation to her leadership campaign. But she faced a setback earlier this week when, in an exclusive interview with The Herald, Scotland Office Minister David Cairns ruled out the possibility of the Scottish Parliament being given greater fiscal autonomy. Mr Cairns said extending the devolution settlement was only of interest to 'the McChattering classes'.'
Kevin Schofield in the Herald, 14 th February 2008.

'Just when she thought it was safe to go back to normal politics, a new problem has appeared for Wendy Alexander - and this time it comes from her own side. No sooner had she put the dodgy donation row behind her and shrugged off SNP cries of 'whitewash' than she found her initiative to secure more powers for Holyrood under attack from her own Westminster colleagues.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 14 th February 2008.

'There's not a lot Wendy Alexander can do about today's Labour Party meeting in Glasgow - calling it a 'crisis summit' is in no way an exaggeration - except hope for the best.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 15 th February 2008.

'This lady is merely the leader of the Labour group of MSPs in the Scottish Parliament. And, as such, she carries a deal of influence that is some way short of overwhelming at today's meeting. The 46 Labour members of the Scottish Parliament, therefore, owe her their undivided loyalty, at the very least because none of them had the guts to stand against her for the parliamentary leadership last summer.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 15 th February 2008.

'Unfortunately for the lady and her current problems, the 40 Labour MPs at Westminster and the 348 Labour councillors out there along the highways and by-ways of Scottish local government owe her nothing.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 15 th February 2008.

'After a week of toxic exchanges between MPs and MSPs over the way ahead for constitutional reform, Labour politicians gathered in Glasgow and agreed to bury the hatchet over recent feuding about Wendy Alexander's plans for a commission to look at extending Holyrood's powers. There has been a wave of internal dissent between MPs, MSPs and councillors as Labour has struggled to come to terms with the election of Alex Salmond as First Minister.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 16 th February 2008.

'Gordon Brown and his MPs want something a lot more modest than Wendy's Holyrood gang hope for and after yesterday's meeting, there's no doubt that he's getting his way. The statement committed the party to supporting 'the initiative to strengthen devolution and secure Scotland's position as part of the United Kingdom'. Nothing there about transferring powers, is there And far from calling the body that Ms Alexander wants to chair a 'commission', it's not even referred to now as a 'review body' or 'working party', it's now called a mere 'initiative.' How humiliating is that And where does Wendy go from here?'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 16 th February 2008.

'The notion that the Constitutional Commission has been endorsed by MPs is fanciful. 'It was an agreement to explore an area of activity, not an agreement to act,' was how one MSP put it. 'Recent differences cannot be reconciled in a single week.' From the Scottish leadership camp there was undisguised relief and a hint of bitterness that Westminster MPs had turned yesterday into a leadership crisis for Ms Alexander.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 16 th February 2008.

'Mr Brown said she (Alexander) was 'doing a very good job in difficult circumstances... after the Scottish Parliament elections' last May, when Labour lost to the Scottish National Party. Ms Alexander faced calls to resign after her Scottish Labour leadership campaign accepted an illegal donation. While the Electoral Commission found there was insufficient evidence to prove an offence, it said not all reasonable steps had been taken to prevent one.'
BBC Scotland News, 17 th February 2008.

'Gordon Brown has signalled that the Scottish parliament could be given more tax-raising powers, flatly contradicting statements made by one of his ministers last week. In a BBC Scotland interview broadcast today, the prime minister said that there is a case for reviewing the devolution settlement and in particular the financial arrangements. Last week, David Cairns, the Scotland Office minister, brushed aside talk of substantial new powers for Holyrood as an inward-looking issue for the 'McChattering classes'.'
Bill Mackintosh in the Sunday Herald, 17 th February 2008.

'Fresh controversy arose last week concerning an organisation called the Scottish Industry Forum (SIF), which allegedly gave money from two dinners held in 2002 to Alexander's constituency office towards her 2003 election campaign. Some guests have claimed that they attended thinking it was an event to establish bridges between government and business, and were unaware that proceeds from the dinner would fund the local Labour Party. When the row broke last week, Labour gave conflicting accounts of the nature of the SIF. Foulkes said that the forum was 'never billed as politically neutral'. A Labour spokesman said the forum was separate from the party. However, last night Robertson, a former UK defence secretary, claimed the organisation was 'explicitly and unashamedly' set up by the party and 'did not pretend to be anything else'.'
James Hamilton in the Sunday Herald, 17 th February 2008.

'Senior sources still fear the commission proposed by Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander could trigger full-blown civil war within the party once its recommendations are returned.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 17 th February 2008.

'Embattled Labour leader Wendy Alexander is in more trouble after she laid a motion praising a shopping centre that gave her donations of £1600. She had already declared the donations, but not indicating such an interest when publishing the motion is a breach of the Scottish Parliament's code of conduct. If found guilty of this, it would be the third breach she's been reported for since taking over as Labour leader at Holyrood.'
Campbell Gunn in the Sunday Post, 17 th February 2008.

'Two weeks ago, the Electoral Commission announced there was insufficient evidence to report the matter of Ms Alexander's impermissible £950 donation from a Jersey-based businessman to the procurator fiscal for further action. However, the Parliament's Standards Commissioner has reported her to the fiscal for failing to declare all donations to her election campaign fund on her register of interests. It is now up to the fiscal to decide whether a police investigation will be carried out. The revelation about the Braehead motion and donations will further increase the pressure.'
Campbell Gunn in the Sunday Post, 17 th February 2008.

'Of course over the last few months the Electoral Commission investigation has been something that, as she says, has been bruising and salutary, but at the same time it said in the report that she took significant steps to deal with the problems and, of course, that is now over.'
Prime Minister the Rt Hon Dr J. Gordon Brown MP, 17 th February 2008.

'You might think that. I couldn't possibly comment.'
Chief Whip the Rt Hon Francis Urquhart MP, in House of Cards by Michael Dobbs.

'Senior Labour figures including the Prime Minister rallied behind Wendy Alexander over the weekend as more allegations were made about political donations. In the 10 days since the Electoral Commission said there would be no further action against her regarding an illegal donation to her leadership campaign, questions have continued to be asked about previous donations to her constituency office in Paisley.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 18 th February 2008.

'Wendy Alexander came under new pressure on two fronts yesterday over claims she broke Holyrood's rules. The first came after she lodged a motion praising the Braehead shopping mall, but failed to indicate she had received a donation of £1600 from the centre. And in another blow, police were asked to investigate claims that funds raised by a Labour-supporting business organisation were illegally channelled into Alexander's constituency office.'
Daily Record, 18 th February 2008.

'The Scotland Act, which set up the Scottish Parliament, specifically prohibits paid advocacy.
'Provision shall be made prohibiting a member of the Parliament from advocating or initiating any cause or matter on behalf of any person, by any means specified in the provision, in consideration of any payment or benefit in kind,' it states.
If found guilty of such an offence the penalty is a fine of up to £5000.
Abbotsinch Properties obtained planning permission for 60 acres of land to the south of St James Interchange.
Abbotsinch Properties donated £300 to Alexander.
In relation to this development by Abbotsinch Alexander said:
'I am certain this development will make a big impact on the area by bringing up to 5,000 new jobs, as well as offering businesses a strategic base next to Scotland's busiest airport.'
More paid advocacy Alexander
Tesco have been chosen as the preferred bidder for the redevelopment of Linwood Shopping Centre.
'Following a deal brokered by Wendy Alexander, the local MSP, Tesco has agreed to take a controlling interest the town's central shopping precinct, most of whose existing shopping units are vandalised and boarded up.'
'Credit must go to Wendy Alexander for brokering the deal.'
'The proposal has been championed by the local MSP, Labour's Wendy Alexander.
'Tesco's exciting new plans will transform the town centre,' she wrote.
Tesco donated £500 to Alexander.
More paid advocacy Alexander
That's 3 counts so far!'
Tam, Glasgow in the Herald, 18 th February 2008.

'Meanwhile, police were looking at claims businessmen handed £12,000 to the Scottish Industry Forum in 2002 without knowing the money would be used by Alexander.'
Daily Record, 18 th February 2008.

'From the IPOS-MORI Website: The Scottish Industry Forum is an independent business organisation set up in 1995 to facilitate dialogue between the business community and the government. It has no political affiliation and does not require members to have any particular political views.
Lord Robertson: the Scottish Industry Forum was 'explicitly and unashamedly created to build relationships between Labour in opposition and industrial and business interests', and that 'it did not pretend to be anything else'.
When did it change from being apolitical to being offertly political?'
Scotsgait in the Herald, 18 th February 2008.

'How the leader of the opposition in the Scottish Parliament can stay in office while the fraud squad and procurator fiscal are both formally investigating her wouldn't make it into the script of Ashes to Ashes. Too far-fetched.'
George Galloway in the Daily Record, 18 th February 2008.

'Now I know Wendy Alexander isn't likely to face an intensive interrogation (they save those for the likes of Tommy Sheridan's missus and crimes such as who put what appendage where and when) but surely a temporary 'standing down' is in order. Would Donald Dewar, Bruce Millan or Willie Ross have clung on to office in this desperately demeaning way?'
George Galloway in the Daily Record, 18 th February 2008.

'Scotland has been transformed by the highly proficient minority nationalist government of Alex Salmond. If there were an election today, even after Brown's intervention, the SNP would almost certainly be returned by a landslide. Brown's miscalculation, and Labour's failure to allow its Scottish leadership to make its own decisions, has launched a process which could lead to the break-up of the United Kingdom.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 18 th February 2008.

'The SNP have proved that they've been very popular in Government, they've been very effective - they've been very Scottish.'
Former Labour First Minister of Scotland the Rt Hon Henry McLeish 18 th February 2008.

'The rift between Labour politicians in London and Edinburgh deepened yesterday when Henry McLeish, a former first minister, said it was time his Westminster counterparts stopped 'sniping' at Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader. Mr McLeish was reacting to comments from David Cairns, the Scotland Office minister, who last week dismissed Ms Alexander's drive for more powers for the Scottish Parliament as of interest only to the 'McChattering classes'.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 19 th February 2008.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander's fightback continued yesterday with the appointment of her latest spin doctor and the support of former First Minister Henry McLeish. But both developments were to a degree undermined by the new aide's lack of Holyrood or political experience, and Mr McLeish's frank views on Labour's recent difficulties.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 19 th February 2008.

'Simon Pia, 52, who used to write The Scotsman Diary and was recently a broadcaster on Talk 107, is the new official spokesman for Ms Alexander, filling a role that has been vacant for three months since the abrupt and embarrassing departure of Matthew Marr. Mr Marr quit in November after a series of drunken outbursts at an awards evening, the most abusive of which were directed at Alex Salmond, the First Minister. Another spin doctor, Brian Lironi, left last summer, apparently after difficulties with Ms Alexander's style of leadership.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 19 th February 2008.

'Tesco as we know are regular contributors to the Alexander cause. Tesco have also been asked by Renfrewshire council to effectively take over Linwood Town Centre in the name of 'Regeneration'. This may or may not result in everyone in Linwood being forced to wear white t-shirts and baseball caps with the phrase 'Tesco Value Range: Labour Voter', emblazoned upon them.'
Oskar Matzerath in the Herald, 19 th February 2008.

'They say a week is long time in politics, and in Holyrood last week that cliché rang true. Amongst the dramatic events were Scottish Labour Leader Wendy Alexander being reported to the procurator fiscal by the Scottish Parliament's Standards Commissioner for failing to declare donations, and later receiving a controversial 'not proven'-type decision from the Electoral Commission on her illegal donations.'
Stewart Stevenson MSP in the Banffshire Journal, 19 th February 2008.

'A journalist who once described Wendy Alexander as 'Gruppenfuhrer' has been appointed as the Labour leader's new spin doctor. Simon Pia, former diarist for The Scotsman, is the latest in a string of spin doctors for Alexander since she became leader. Brian Lironi quit soon after she took over and Matthew Marr was forced to quit after being heard swearing at SNP leader Alex Salmond.'
Daily Record, 19 th February 2008.

'There is a new face in the Garden Lobby at Holyrood. One Simon Pia. Who he Wendy Alexander's new spin doctor, that's who. Simon, an amiable and estimable chap, should be well equipped for the trials of his new task. He has, after all, known pain as an avid supporter of Hibernian Football Club, having chronicled their exploits in book form. As a former newspaper diarist, he was also less than complimentary about Ms Alexander, calling her 'Gruppenfuhrer' in reference to her supposedly brusque manner. Could have been worse, I suppose. He could have used a lower SS rank, such as Rottenfuhrer. (No, I didn't invent that: look it up.) Plainly internationalist in his insults, the bold Pia also shifted eastwards to call her 'Stalinist'.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland's political editor, 19 th February 2008.

'Brown should do nothing to help them, even if Wendy Alexander's febrile intellect has concluded that he should.'
Tim Luckhurst in the Guardian, 20 th February 2008.

'The SNP was quick to hit back, accusing Lord Foulkes of putting the service in jeopardy through 'smear tactics' to distract attention from his own party's 'troubles' - a reference to the recent donations scandal threatening Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander.'
Julia Horton in the Herald, 20 th February 2008.

'Gordon Brown was oblivious to the irony in his statement supporting (OK, commenting on) Wendy Alexander's intention to have a commission to examine what further powers are needed by Holyrood. He backed Wendy all the way, he said, in her open-minded review of the powers presently held by Holyrood. But, he went on, there would be no question of independence or any other ideological policy being discussed. Scotland would remain British.'
Margo MacDonald MSP in the Evening News, 20 th February 2008.

'What did Simon Pia do in a former life to deserve the one he has now He's just spent two years working with the high-octane, high-pitched Heather Dee on Talk 107, and now he's got Wendy Alexander in his ear on a daily basis. I can only think that rather than losing his marbles as has been suggested since taking the post of spin doctor to the Scottish Labour leader, it's his hearing that's failing.'
Gina Davidson in the Evening News, 21 st February 2008.

'The Electoral Commission has finally concluded its probe into Labour's illegal donations saga saying no further action will be taken against MSP Charles Gordon.The watchdog announced yesterday that an illegal loan of £950 from Jersey businessman Paul Green had been repaid by Mr Gordon's Glasgow South Labour Party, and on that basis there would be no further proceedings.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'Yesterday, the Electoral Commission announced that the Scottish Labour Party had handed in the £950 received from Mr Green for Mr Gordon's election campaign and no further action would be taken against Mr Gordon or the party.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 21 st February 2008.

'Charles Gordon broke the law by accepting an illegal donation, and his punishment is an order to hand over the ill-gotten cash. Likewise Wendy Alexander. Doesn't this look like one rule for politicians and one for rule for the rest of us, who might expect something a bit more punitive Of course it does. The law on political funding is being severely tested under the current range of investigations being undertaken by the Electoral Commission, and it does not look fit for purpose.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'There are still two possible investigations into the affair, one by the police into a complaint by the Standards Commissioner, Jim Dyer, and one which SNP MSPs say they will start in the Holyrood standards committee.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 21 st February 2008.

'Attempts by Mr Gordon and Ms Alexander to put the whole saga behind them are likely to face further difficulty in the press. Ms Alexander may have been cleared by the Electoral Commission over one set of donations, but inquiries continue over her receipt of funds from Labour fundraising dinners and her decision to lodge a motion praising Braehead shopping centre without flagging up the fact that she had received donations from some of those involved.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'There was no explanation about the Charles Gordon case, despite evidence already made public that suggested he knew the Paul Green donation from Jersey had to be made to look as if it came from a Glasgow firm.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'The Wendy Alexander finding was more revealing than some supposed. It showed she had broken the law on accepting the donation, but had passed it to the Commission, and under the law, there was no further action possible. It did not give a judgment on the charge of intent to conceal. On the contrary, there was not sufficient evidence, and it wasn't 'in the public interest' to push for prosecution. That could mean several things. Among them are a calculation the evidence was not sufficiently strong. It could be the offence was not worth police time. It could mean the commission saw the political price they had paid through publicity and reckoned that was enough.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'Cosla is not shy about welcoming the new respect it is being shown - and any time Wendy Alexander cares to touch on local government at First Minister's Questions, Alex Salmond is quick to quote Mr Watters and other Labour councillors, one of whom allegedly went as far as commenting: 'God bless the SNP government'. It is deeply damaging to Labour's credibility.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 21 st February 2008.

'Last night Mr Gordon argued that the commission's decision not to proceed against him drew a line under the affair. But opponents claimed the continued gap between admitted breaches of the law and action against politicians would erode public confidence in the system.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'The fact is that the Labour Mafia have been breaking the law, and getting away with it, for more than 50 years. They clearly have the utmost contempt for the law, and also for voters. The law will do nothing against them. Voters may, however wreak a horrible revenge on this party that is rotten to the core.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'Great I can now steal a new plasma screen, watch it for a few months, get caught, claim I bought it legally, let it be proven that I didn't and then hand it back and get off with it.'
Wardog, Buckie, in the Herald, 21 st February 2008

'What can we say that hasn't been said already. The Scottish Unionist establishment are corrupt, we knew that already. However what this episode has shown is the level of contempt that they have for not just the electorate but for Scottish Law.'
George Alexander in the Herald, 21 st February 2008.

'There is something very wrong with the justice system when membership of the Labour party effectively means immunity from prosecution.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Scotsman, 21 st February 2008.

'Labour councillors the length and breadth of Scotland are thanking God for the SNP. Indeed, the only people facing job insecurity in Scotland seem to be Wendy Alexander's spin doctors.'
First Minister the Rt Hon Alex Salmond MP MSP, 21 st February 2008.

'SNP group leader Steve Cardownie accused Labour's Holyrood leader Wendy Alexander of an 'absolute lie' when she wrote in the News recently that Gorgie City Farm was under threat.'
Alan Roden in the Evening News, 22 nd February 2008.

With Alexander under investigation for accepting an illegal donation from Jersey, was it wise to remind voters of this by posing with a Jersey cow at Gorgie farm?

'No matter if you agree or disagree with Tommy Sheridan's politics, it has been shameful to see the fervour the authorities have in going after the Sheridans and their friends especially his wife Gail. She has been employed by BA for 23 years and yet only now have they suspended her following being charged last week. It is shameful and an outrage that we are witnessing this. The harrassment and hounding of them and remember he won his case in court, has been shameful and an outrage and more suited to medieval times. All the while Wendy Alexander admitted breaking the law and gets away with it supported by the press and institutions who are punishing the Sheridans.'
Indyleith in the Herald, 23 rd February, 2008'

'Meanwhile, Wendy Alexander - still gaining her feet after a torrid first few months as Labour leader - has made the constitution her focal issue. A skim of her party's website tells you only one thing - that they are against the Nationalists. So where's the grounding for Scotland's political forces What are their visions for society Where are the thinkers and wonks working in the shadows of their leaders to flesh out their policies and philosophies?'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 24 th February 2008.

'PRISON OVERCROWDING
Too many offenders to know what to do with Criminals clogging up the courts Fear not, for help is at hand. Just call in the Electoral Commission - the people who make crime disappear.
Charlie Gordon (his real name) was a serial offender, addicted to secret donations. He'd fallen in with a bad crowd in Glasgow politics and ended in a tight spot with his property developer friends.
But last week he was released into the community, a free man. A credit to himself and his party.
'If it hadn't been for the Electoral Commission, they'd have thrown away the key,' said Charlie. 'I just can't believe it. I admitted a breach of the law and resigned my shadow cabinet post, but now I'm off scot-free. I'm over the moon.'
Wendy Alexander had form as long as your arm. Schemes such as the Scottish Industry Forum netted her thousands to feed her addiction to politics.
It looked like the law had finally caught up with her over an illegal donation from a tax exile. Until she called in the Electoral Commission. Now she too is back in the community, hoping to start a new life as leader of the Scottish Labour Party." I owe everything to the Electoral Commission," she said. 'Now I can raise as many dodgy donations as I wish with total security.'
If the Electoral Commission can do this for hardened cases like these, just think what it could do for you! Breaches of the law simply vanish. Prosecutions disappear. Kills 99% of nationalists stone dead.
So, how does the Electoral Commission work How does it turn breaches of the law into administrative mistakes This is because of its secret ingredient: discretion. Other crime-solving agents, such as procurators-fiscal, have to go through a laborious procedure called the justice system.
The Electoral Commission cuts through all that by removing the legal middlemen and handing out ex-post-facto justifications for politicians who fail to obey the law. It is guaranteed to find most politicians innocent.
But be warned. If you don't have the Electoral Commission on your side you could be at risk.
Tommy Sheridan doesn't have their cover. He and his wife Gail have been arrested and charged because they allegedly broke the law of perjury.
If only they could have the help of the Electoral Commission, they too might avoid the justice system.
So remember. Don't accept inferior brands. Electoral Commission washes whiter.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 24 th February 2008.

'Is there no crime on the streets any more? How can one man's family be harassed by police and his wife compared to a 'terrorist' while another woman, a self-confessed liar and crook, and her henchmen be immune from prosecution?'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 25 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander was accused in a Sunday newspaper of failing to declare a £900 donation from an education company when she bowled a soft question in a committee hearing to a company representative.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 25 th February 2008.

'Another Labour MSP, Deputy Presiding Officer Trish Godman, yesterday defended her financial affairs in connection with her son, who faces three years in a US jail for fraud. 'I make no apology for standing by my son while he was awaiting trial in America,' she said.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 25 th February 2008.

'We are living in a period in which the Palace of Westminster is being dragged kicking and screaming into the new era of transparency and accountability, which this Labour government itself initiated following the sleaze scandals of the 1990s. As with the dodgy donations row, which brought politicians such as Wendy Alexander to the brink of resignation, Labour politicians never thought that the new strictures really applied to them. Now they know.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 25 th February 2008

'The Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced that a review into devolution could actually result in the loss of some of Scotland's existing powers as well as the increase in others. Mr Brown voiced his support for the Scottish Labour Party leader Wendy Alexander's Constitutional Commission in an interview with the BBC. However, he stressed that a review would not be a 'one-way street' and that powers previously devolved could be returned to Westminster.'
Helen Walker in the Edinburgh Journal, 26 th February 2008.

'Anyway, with the Wendy thing out of the way the boys from the EC were out to play again. Armed with the taxpayers' chequebook, they took a whole load of hacks - plus a whole load of themselves, of course - for a slap-up feed at a top Edinburgh eatery. But my spies tell me - yes, you've guessed it, The Courier wasn't invited - that they ran out of lager before 9pm. Inviting a load of hacks for a swally and then running out of drink is not exactly the way to make friends and influence people. Mind you, after the fiasco of the Holyrood elections last May in which 140,000 folk's votes were declared void, no-one should be surprised. What's it they say some people couldn't organise in a brewery?'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 27 th February 2008.

'According to Labour's leader, meanwhile, the First Minister 'has got his knickerbockers in a twist' over local income tax. And your punchline will be arriving precisely when, Ms Alexander? Probably, if yesterday was anything to go by, only after someone else has delivered it first.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 29 th February 2008.

'It would be nice to report that Ms Alexander and Alex Salmond traded blows. In fact, they traded quotations. Derisively, the First Minister quoted our old colleague Simon Pia, the latest individual to attempt to prove that there is a difference between the Labour spin machine and a revolving door.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 29 th February 2008.

'That was appalling. Wendy Alexander's performance at First Minister's Question Time plumbed new depths of ineptitude yesterday. She not only failed yet again to leave a mark on Alex Salmond but was left looking as if she never would lay a glove on him.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 29 th February 2008.

'In a dent to Wendy Alexander's leadership, the left-wing Labour MSP Elaine Smith refused to toe the party line and voted with the SNP.'
Fiona MacLeod in the Scotsman, 29 th February 2008.

'Ms Alexander seemed to lose the place entirely. Her voice rose by a couple of octaves as she struggled to retain her line of attack amid the sniggers from the Nat benches. Result? She never recovered and her reputation was in tatters last night.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 29 th February 2008.

'Scotland Office minister David Cairns recently poured scorn on the new Constitutional Commission mooted by Labour leader Wendy Alexander and approved by Labour, Conservative and LibDem MSPs.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 1 st March 2008.

'Gordon Brown is refusing to call the body tasked with reviewing devolution a 'commission' because he believes it would give an 'incorrect impression about its status'. The prime minister used that phrase at a Downing Street summit on the Union, a full account of which has been leaked to this newspaper. He also backed a review of Holyrood's financial powers only after he was pushed on the issue by UK justice secretary Jack Straw and Scotland secretary Des Browne. Straw had raised the question about the Barnett Formula in the context of its perceived unfairness to England. The revelations are an embarrassment for Labour's Holyrood leader, Wendy Alexander, who wants the so-called 'constitutional commission' to lead a review of Scottish devolution.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd March 2008.

'You can tell when a leader is on the rocks and a party is in the mire when one bad performance triggers a bout of soul-searching and doubt among its ranks. So it is this weekend with Wendy Alexander and the Scottish Labour Party.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 2 nd March 2008.

'It is claimed that, in the autumn, Stephen led his troops into a major offensive in the hotly disputed Trumpland province in the badlands of the Northeast. However, after initial success, it appears that this offensive was beaten back by nationalist forces supported by local tribes who wanted to increase their income from the lucrative international trade in the illegal drug of 'golf'. Stephen's forces are now thought to control less than 10% of the country. Stephen has also attempted to reconstruct an alliance with forces loyal to the opposition leader Wendi al-Xandr. His supporters have agreed to participate in the setting up of a new power-sharing constitutional convention. However, this received a set-back when Wendi al-Xandr's foreign backers insisted that the convention was a means of taking powers away from al-Xandr's militias and have now targeted Stephen and hope to destroy him politically, now he is out in the open.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 2 nd March 2008.

'Whether it was the Labour leader herself or her advisers who decided that it would be a good idea to take on the current Parliamentarian of the Year in a battle of wits is unknown, but one thing we can safely say is this - Alexander is never going to beat the First Minister to a place on the Mock The Week panel.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 2 nd March 2008.

'It is becoming increasingly difficult to believe anything other than there is a serious and growing schism between Labour in Scotland and in Westminster over how much power should be invested in Holyrood and how the UK should operate in the near future.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 2 nd March 2008.

'The dire problem for Labour - and perhaps Alexander's only saving grace at present - is that there doesn't appear to be anyone on the Labour team at Holyrood who could do much better.
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 2 nd March 2008.

'Labour will effectively relaunch Wendy Alexander's leadership this week with a series of policy-based initiatives aimed at putting behind her a difficult first few months in charge. Controversial loans and breaches of electoral law undermined her early months as leader, and there is still little sign of a breakthrough in terms of being able to get the better of Alex Salmond in the Holyrood chamber.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 3 rd March 2008.

'I went to this story thinking it might be another Wendy story, 'Scotland's last witch: Fraud or innocent victim of witch hunt?' Imagine my surprise when I found it was nothing to do with Wendy. Now that she's not really news, she's going to find it hard going to get the publicity she so craves.'
Gregor Addison in the Evening News, 3 rd March 2008.

'An English Tory MP, perhaps not completely au fait with the Alexanders, told a Scottish friend that he almost felt sorry for Douglas when he saw how much trouble his mother Wendy was getting into in Scotland.'
Carlung, Haddington, in the Evening News, 3 rd March 2008.

'The convention's Labour presence, once dominant but now depleted by the new voting system, finds more in common with Mr Swinney than with their party's Holyrood leader, Wendy Alexander. And that's where this conference gets interesting.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 4 th March 2008.

'Not only did the likes of Pat Waters, the Labour leader of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, put his name alongside John Swinney's on the deal, he actually went on television and radio in support of what he'd agreed with the Finance Minister. To say that the likes of Wendy Alexander and Andy Kerr were apoplectic is an understatement.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 4 th March 2008.

'Turkey twizlers and Tesco home-brand lemonade could be on the menu when Prime Minister Gordon Brown comes to Aviemore next month for the Scottish Labour Party's annual conference. We can just see Mr Brown chewing the fat on said twizler over the prudence of fiscal restraint with Scottish leader Wendy Alexander at Highland Council's civic reception for the party's hierarchy.'
Strathspey & Badenoch Herald, 5 th March 2008.
(Wendy Alexander is facing accusations of paid advocacy for Tescos)

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander will not be prosecuted over failing to register donations, the Crown Office has confirmed.'
BBC Scotland News, 6 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader in Scotland, has survived a damaging crisis over £10,000 in undeclared donations after prosecutors announced she would not face charges. Alexander was reported to prosecutors five weeks ago by the Scottish parliamentary standards commissioner after it emerged she had failed to record 10 donations of between £950 and £999 to her leadership campaign with the Scottish parliament.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 6 th March 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander will escape prosecution for failure to register donations to her campaign, the Crown Office said today.'
The Scotsman, 6 th March 2008.

'The referral by Dr Jim Dyer came in the final stages of a parallel inquiry by the Electoral Commission investigation into an illegal £950 gift to her election fund from a businessman based in Jersey. The commission cleared her but added she had failed to take all possible steps to ensure these donations were legal.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 6 th March 2008.

'However, she is still facing a possible fraud inquiry by Strathclyde police, who are investigating complaints that business leaders, senior journalists and public sector executives were duped into buying seats for a Labour fund-raising dinner for her constituency, believing it was an economic regeneration event.'
Severin Carrell in the Guardian, 6 th March 2008.

'Unfortunately for Wendy this is not the end of the matter and her future is still far from secure. Her failure in Parliament and failure to win the support of her party remains a threat to her leadership. The Standards Commissioner must now finish his report and the Parliament's Standards Committee will, as the Crown says, have to make its own decisions on Wendy Alexander's actions.'
Ex SNP Deputy leader, Roseanna Cunningham MSP, 6 th March 2008.

'Of course this is the least of Wendy Alexander's worries, as she has completely failed to make any progress as Labour leader since taking on the position last summer. Labour is still a party incapable of mounting effective opposition in the Scottish Parliament, never mind presenting themselves as a credible alternative government.'
Tory Deputy leader, Murdo Fraser MSP, 6 th March 2008.

'Opponents were quick to point out that the Crown Office ruling was not the same as a clean bill of health at Holyrood, where the standards committee will continue to have the final say.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 7 th March 2008.

'Labour's wee clepto has immunity from prosecution. I heard a story about a lassie in the US who kept stealing chocolate bars. With the 3 strikes and out law she was sentenced to 8 years for her 3rd mars bar. Yet for tens of thousands of pounds it's not in the public interest to prosecute a daugher of the manse.
Aye right.'
Alex Porter in the Herald, 7 th March 2008.

'Since being anointed last September, Miss Alexander, has been mired in scandals.'
Simon Johnson, in the Telegraph, 7 th March 2008.

'Still, who said politics was supposed to be fun? Not Wendy Alexander, and she should know.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 7 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander has also been investigated by the Electoral Commission which carried out an investigation into a £950 donation made to Ms Alexander's campaign by Jersey-based businessman Paul Green. Although the donation was illegal because donations above £200 must come from UK voters, the commission took no action.'
Steve Bargeton in the Courier, 7 th March 2008.

'There will be a test case soon based on the authorities failure to indict Wendy for an admitted criminal act. Some civil rights lawyer will use it to get their client off the hook and then all hell will break out in the Scottish Courts since a quasi legal quango (the Electoral Commission) has tacitly accepted as a defence - I did not mean to break the electoral law even though it is a criminal offence - and by inference the defence is now enshrined in Scottish Law. If ever any decision taken by a quango requires a judicial challenge it has to be the failure of the EC to act against Wendy Alexander. A Judical challenge is in the Scottish Public's best interest.'
Peter Thomson in the Herald, 7 th March 2008.

'Just what does Wendy Alexander and her team have to do to actually be charged with breaking the law? They freely admit that they broke the law and yet the Commission has decided that she has done enough to save being investigated. What a total joke they have made of themselves, what kind of message does this send out to anyone? This is a whitewash no matter what George Foulkes says. Time he returned down south to join the rest of the court jesters in the Lords.'
Sandra Scott in the Daily Record, 8 th March 2008.

'Just days ago it seemed as if culture minister Margaret Hodge's churlish attack on the Proms had carved her an unassailable lead in the Silliest Remark Of The Year contest. Yet she's obviously a complete amateur compared with Terry Kelly, election agent to Wendy Alexander, Labour leader in Scotland. In his blog, Kelly says the Taliban would have easily spotted Harry - who returned to Britain last week - as a 'ginger-haired man staggering about drunk, dressed as a Nazi.'
Roland White in the Times, 9 th March 2007.

'Scottish Labour appeared to be in crisis last night after one of the party's most senior MSPs was caught up in a row about briefing against Wendy Alexander. Margaret Curran, the party's shadow health secretary, has admitted being at the centre of unflattering comments about Alexander's performance as party leader. A recent newspaper piece had stated that Labour MSPs were critical of her performance and judgement, with the phrase 'shocking and appalling' quoted in the story, which is now revealed to have been based on a briefing by Curran.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 9 th March 2008.

'The episode confirms that senior Labour MSPs are beginning to turn against Alexander as she attempts to rebuild her faltering leadership. She faced ridicule last month after shadow Cabinet members had been handed loyalty 'crib sheets' and asked to read them out over the telephone to sympathetic journalists. The scripts were later leaked to a newspaper. Days later, a copy of a shadow Cabinet minute, in which the crib-sheet tactic was declared a success, was also leaked to the media.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 9 th March 2008.

'The Sunday Herald is aware of several Labour figures who, while initially supportive of Alexander's bid to become the party's Holyrood leader, are now doubtful of her abilities for the top job. Alexander's short stint as leader has so far been marred by various investigations into the funding of her leadership bid.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 9 th March 2008.

'I have been told independently that Jack McConnell was expected to step aside after the election to make way for Wendy Alexander, who would have been installed as leader without a contest on the Monday after the election. McConnell's refusal to stand down is regarded by influential figures in Westminster as the main cause of Labour's downfall. Incredible stuff. But it explains a lot, and suggests Brown was Labour's own worst enemy in Scotland.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 9 th March 2008.

'Commenting on Wendy Alexander's reaction to the Cambuslang East by-election result where she described it as an 'excellent result"' despite the Labour vote crashing to 28% from 50% in May 2007, Central Scotland MSP Christina McKelvie said it was a massive blunder by Ms Alexander since if such a result was replicated across Scotland it would leave Labour with only 5 Scottish Parliamentary constituencies.'
Scottish National Party, 9 th March 2008.

'Rangers had a good claim for a penalty rejected when Chris Hogg handled substitute Novo's cutback as he fell but referee Craig Thomson clearly decided that the offence should go unpunished because it was unintentional. Wendy Alexander would have approved.'
Ewing Grahame in the Telegraph, 10 th March 2008.

'The Labour Party has appointed a businessman who gave cash to Wendy Alexander as its new general-secretary. David Pitt-Watson, founder and chairman of city firm Hermes Equity Ownership, gave just under the £1,000 declarable threshold to Ms Alexander. His name was unveiled when the Labour leader in Scotland published the names of all donors as she sought to draw a line under the controversy over her leadership campaign. Mr Pitt-Watson also donated £2,500 to Gordon Brown's uncontested leadership campaign last year.'
Gerri Peev in the Scotsman, 11 th March 2008.

'On the same theme, wasn't it a remarkable coincidence that Wendy Alexander chose this very topic of the duty on alcohol to pursue with the first minister at questions in Holyrood last week Without supporting or opposing an increase in duty, she nevertheless challenged Alex Salmond over his attitude to the cost of drink and its impact on society. How very prescient.'
Brian Taylor on BBC Scotland, 12 th March 2008.

'Talking of drink, there's a good article on the BBC about TVs.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7291578.stm
'Early colour sets were very expensive and had a habit of a setting fire to people's curtains,' says Trenouth.'They were often referred to as 'curtain burners' by the engineers who serviced them.'
Funny to read that, as for my generation the thing that sets fire to the curtains is a drunken Labour MSP.
Hence the expression 'Drunk as a Lord' I guess.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 12 th March 2008.

'Windy Wendy highlights that she is now an opposition politician for opposition sake. Forget the unfairness of the Council Tax, forget too that LIT will address that basic unfairness in a way that will benefit ordinary workers, working families and pensioners (the large majority of Scots). Here we have a discredited politician, who can be bought for £995, defending the indefensible.'
Calumn 10, in the Scotsman, 13 th March 2008.

'Q. How can you tell if Wendy Alexander is lying?
A. Her lips move.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Herald, 14 th March 2008.

'The Electoral Commission has defended the way it handled its inquiry into donations to Wendy Alexander's Scottish Labour leadership campaign.'
BBC News, 15 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander's leadership campaign team solicited a payment of £950 from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green. The donation was illegal because it came from someone not on the electoral register.'
BBC News, 15 th March 2008.

'Clearly the Electoral Commission want to justify their investigation into Wendy Alexander. The problem the commission now faces is that there is little faith left in its enforcement of the laws.'
SNP MSP, Roseanna Cunningham, 15 th March 2008.

'When is an illegal donation actually illegal What will happen to anyone accepting, knowingly or otherwise, an illegal donation in the future The commission may feel it acted properly in the investigation but the Wendy Alexander decision has created a black hole in our electoral laws.'
SNP MSP, Roseanna Cunningham, 15 th March 2008.

'This week's dry slap goes to Wendy Alexander's half-wit election agent Terry Kelly for his outburst over Prince Harry's stint in Afghanistan. OK. Harry's far from perfect, but the boy did good getting out there and mucking in at the frontline. Idiot Kelly says Harry is 'oafish and dimwitted' and 'of no value and an embarrassment to us all'. No, Terry. That's you, pal.'
Anna Smith in the Daily Mirror, 16 th March 2008.

'If the impression gains ground that Wendy Alexander is Brown's Holyrood puppet, it will be a hard political negative. Worse, if Wendy is seen to be conniving a punitive approach to Scotland at Brown's behest she could even split the party. Scottish Labour is in a poor condition and divided over the national question. Labour MPs and UK ministers want it to be an out and out unionist party, dedicated to destroying the Nats. Others, such as those around former leaders Jack McConnell and Henry McLeish, want the party to challenge the SNP on its own territory, seeking greater autonomy for Scotland and dumping the 'unionist"' tag altogether.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 16 th March 2008.

'More people want Wendy to quit than think she is doing a good job. Even amongst Labour voters only 39% back Alexander whilst 66% think Alex Salmond is doing a good job. Another expenses scandal is the last thing Labour need right now. Secretive trips to the House of Lords and meetings with newspaper editors and key campaign members don't look much like constituency or parliamentary business. As Labour supporters and members drift away Wendy is once again faced with questions to answer.'
SNP MSP, Alex Neil, 16 th March 2008.

'The UK's Information Commissioner is set to decide whether emails provided by Wendy Alexander to the investigation into her leadership campaign should be published. The Electoral Commission, the body that decided not to refer Alexander's breach of donations law to prosecutors, believes it would be 'unfair' on the Labour leader to make her evidence publicly available. The dispute will be settled by information tsar Richard Thomas, whose recent decisions have led to embarrassing details being released on MPs' expenses.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 16 th March 2008.

'First Minister and Scottish Nationalist Pary leader Alex Salmond has recorded an unprecedented 75 percent lead in approval ratings over Labour rival Wendy Alexander.'
The Times of Malta, 16 th March 2008.

'It is Alexander's personal approval ratings that will worry Scottish Labour as it prepares for its conference in Aviemore later this month. The MRUK results confirm her dreadful start as party leader has been noticed by voters.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 16 th March 2008.

'The result suggested the SNP would win 57 seats and Labour 44 if an election was held tomorrow, with the Tories projected to take 16 seats and the Lib Dems 12. Salmond also proved more popular than Alexander. Seventy per cent of voters thought he was doing a good job, compared with 17 per cent who believed he was doing badly, giving him an approval rating of plus 53 per cent. Thirty per cent of voters said Alexander was doing well and 52 per cent thought she was doing a bad job - giving her an approval rating of minus 22 per cent.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 17 th March 2008.

'Right now, I'd say Labour's best bet looks like assassination. With Alex Salmond leading by a ridiculous 75% over his Labour rival, Wendy Alexander, in a weekend poll, Labour's only immediate chance of getting back in the race would be to eliminate the SNP leader altogether.'
Herald editorial, 17 th March 2008.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander has hit back at suggestions a series of her expense claims had broken parliamentary rules. The leader lodged claims for travel and meetings while she was planning her leadership campaign. Parliamentary rules prohibit MSPs from using Holyrood expenses for political campaigning.'
The Press Association, 17 th March 2008.

'Labour faced more pressure over expenses yesterday, when Sunday papers published evidence that Deputy Presiding Officer Trish Godman has charged the taxpayer for renting an Edinburgh flat from her son. The questions for Wendy Alexander also continued, with claims that she used Holyrood expenses to pursue her leadership campaign last autumn. Her spokesman responded with an unusually strong counter-attack on 'malicious and shoddy journalism, wild speculation and conspiracy theory'.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 17 th March 2008.

'This rare evidence of Scottish public opinion shows Salmond out-polling Wendy Alexander by a colossal margin. Their favourability ratings, taking the negatives from the positives, put him 53 points in the black, while the Labour leader is 22 points in deficit. She clearly trails the First Minister even among Labour voters.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 17 th March 2008.

'This comes less than two weeks before the first Scottish Labour party conference since it lost power, with Ms Alexander's own six months as leader facing criticism along with significant doubts about her future. Much of the public perception of her leadership results from media reporting of her campaign fundraising, which broke the law, so perhaps the surprise is that as many as 30% of people think she is doing a good job as leader. It will not help that new allegations were published yesterday, saying her Holyrood allowances were used to support her leadership bid. Such stories have led 40% of those polled to be less likely to support Labour, and a minority think she should quit.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 17 th March 2008.

'At the Scottish Labour conference the weekend after next, there will be a series of reforms to organisation designed to improve the party machine. At this stage, these fall notably short of the complete transformation promised by Wendy Alexander at her accession to the leadership.'
Brian Taylor on BBC News, 18 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander faces a crucial conference amid doubts about her leadership, poll ratings that leave a gulf between public confidence in her and Alex Salmond, and a trail of negative publicity about her leadership campaign fund-raising.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 19 th March 2008.

'Labour leader Wendy Alexander has dismissed her poor opinion poll ratings and said she was confident Labour would win the battle of ideas.'
The Press Association, 19 th March 2008.

'Defending the (local income tax) plans, Mr Salmond said the detailed figures had been published, responding: 'I suggest Wendy Alexander reads them. If she does, she will learn that taxation based on ability to pay is fairer than taxation like the council tax - which the Labour Party managed to increase from March 1997 to last year by 62%.'
BBC Scotland News, 20 th March 2008.

'Anyhow. Here's the grown-up stuff. Labour said nothing of importance, yesterday, in your parliament. Not a word. A local income tax is fair but problematic: this is known. So From Labour, nothing useful. How come, then, that the party of the people winds up defending a ruthless property tax? Apparently, and I paraphrase, no-one cares.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 21 st March 2008.

'Another principal aim of the new group, which is expected to see regular meetings between David Cairns, the Scotland Office minister of state, and Wendy Alexander, the Labour leader in Scotland, as well as their advisers, is to try to improve the increasingly poisonous relationships between Labour's two halves.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 22 nd March 2008.

'The straw that finally snapped the relationship asunder was Holyrood Labour losing last May's election to the hated SNP, a reverse that was blamed on the unpopularity of the Labour-led coalition Executive. This attitude is hardly fair, given that the election campaign last year was largely orchestrated by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown who were, basically, given a run around by Alex Salmond. But when it comes to relationships within the Labour Party, fairness never gets a look-in. This ill-feeling has been magnified by the apparent inability - thus far, at any rate - of Wendy Alexander and her team to dent the First Minister's popularity.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 22 nd March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander suffered a new blow as Labour leader when an opinion poll last-week gave her a MINUS 22per cent personal approval rating. Alex Salmond opened up a staggering 75 per cent lead over his main rival with a 53 per cent rating. It suggests the SNP would extend their lead from one seat to 13 if there was an election tomorrow. The result came as Labour's popularity hit its lowest since 1983. Is it the end for the first woman to lead Scottish Labour? Or can Wendy mend it?'
Steve Dineen in the Sunday Mail, 23 rd March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander sought to draw a line under her tumultuous first few months as Scottish Labour leader yesterday, with a new policy document in advance of her party's conference in Aviemore this week. Much of the 28-page manifesto is devoted to defending the Union, but it also admits changes to the current constitutional arrangement are needed. However, the Labour leader came under fire from the Scottish Government and the Liberal Democrats for suggesting some powers could be returned to Westminster.'
Tristan Stewart-Robertson in the Scotsman, 24 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has not had an easy ride as Labour's new leader in Scotland. Public disenchantment with Gordon Brown's handling of the various crises that have beset the UK has widened the gap in the national opinion polls between Labour and the SNP. Indeed, the latest poll puts Labour and the SNP neck-and-neck for the first time ever in a prospective Westminster contest.'
Scotsman editorial, 24 th March 2008.

''Change Is What We Do' - or so says the title of Wendy Alexander's latest mission statement. I'm tempted to say: what? - leaders? But that would be cheap.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 24 th March 2008.

'The reason Labour is in its present state in Scotland is largely because it has allowed other parties to colonise its social democratic agenda - while Gordon Brown allowed private equity barons to pay less tax than their cleaners, and non-domiciled plutocrats to avoid paying any tax at all on their foreign wealth. Iraq Trident Nuclear power I'm sorry, Wendy, but we won't be fooled again.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 24 th March 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander, who wants to consider handing devolved powers back to Westminster, has clashed with her Lib Dem opposite number Nicol Stephen, who does not.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 25 th March 2008.

'The Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, has been damaged by scandal, which errupted last November, involving illegal donations to her leadership campaign. The poll, which surveyed over 1000 adults across Scotland between February and March, found that 40 per cent were less likely to support Labour because of the recent controversy surrounding Ms Alexander and a quarter thought she should resign over the issue. The Scottish Labour Party also faces problems from within, with party membership dropping by around a quarter since 2002, positioning the SNP to overtake Labour as Scotland's largest party in the near future.'
Helen Walker in the Edinburgh Journal, 25 th March 2008.

'Observers have remarked that the party of Scottish independence should be doing so well when support for independence itself is low, at only 23 per cent. One suggested reason for this is public discontent with the SNP's major rival, the Scottish Labour Party. The Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, has been damaged by scandal, which errupted last November, involving illegal donations to her leadership campaign.'
The Edinburgh Journal, 26 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader at Holyrood, found resistance and doubts at Westminster, and the UK Government machine has been slow to support her.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 26 th March 2008.

'Rather than solving Labour's problems, Ms Alexander's policy document simply illustrates the lack of ambition and idealism inherent throughout her party.'
Gavin Fleming in the Scotsman, 26 th March 2008.

'Take Gordon Brown's firm pre-election assertion that devolution was a done deal and there would be no further powers on offer. Now he's extensively briefing that everything, including who taxes whom, is in the melting pot - though, tellingly, he envisages a two-way street, including Scottish cabinet secretaries ceding certain controls back to Number 10, a prospect endorsed by Wendy Alexander. Here, you suspect, Ms Alexander's finger is poised over something other than the public pulse.'
Ryan Taylor in the Herald, 26 th March 2008.

'The MSP for Paisley North has also been dogged by an illegal donation to her successful Scottish Labour leadership campaign fund, and continued speculation about how long she would last in the job.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'In the first parliament, she became communities minister and, after Mr McLeish's elevation to first minister, moved into his former position on enterprise. She tackled the issue of housing stock transfer - strongly opposed among Glasgow housing groups - and waded into a row involving the senior Australian banker Frank Cicutto.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'After making comments - which she said had been misinterpreted - that Scotland's economy had been in permanent recession for 200 years, Ms Alexander made a speech at a STUC conference in which she referred to 'pesky Aussie put-downs'.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'A row also erupted over a leaked letter she wrote to former SNP deputy leader Jim Sillars, in which she said perhaps the last time the Labour movement in Scotland had made 'a real intellectual contribution' to the party nationally was in 1906.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'Just a few months into the job, the leadership was rocked by an episode which it, and the party, could have done without.Ms Alexander's campaign team accepted an illegal £950 donation from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green, which broke the rules because he was not a UK voter.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'She soldiered on, refusing to resign under intense pressure from the SNP, insisting she was confident of being cleared by the Electoral Commission watchdog. The resignation of Peter Hain as UK Work and Pensions Secretary to 'clear his name,' as the police investigated more than £100,000 of undeclared donations to his deputy Labour leadership campaign, added to the pressure.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander was eventually cleared by the Electoral Commission, concluding she took significant steps to comply with the law - but did not take 'all reasonable steps'. The SNP claimed the finding was a whitewash.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'In a separate issue, the Crown Office said she would not be prosecuted over failing to register donations on the MSPs' register of interests. Ms Alexander said she was initially told she did not need to register the donations, after seeking advice from the clerk to the Scottish Parliament's standards committee.'
Andrew Black on BBC Scotland News, 27 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander faces a major test this weekend as she attends her first Scottish Labour conference as leader. Given her trials and tribulations since taking over from Jack McConnell, it is sometimes difficult to remember she has only been in post for six months. Speculation continues on how much longer she might remain there. Even some of her supporters are unwilling to predict if she will lead Labour into the next Scottish Parliament elections in 2011.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 27 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander is generally held to have improved her performance at First Minister's Questions in recent weeks, but an opinion poll earlier this month gave Alex Salmond an amazing 75 per cent lead over her in the approval ratings.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 27 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander was unopposed when she stood for the leadership last summer, but her way has been piled high with obstacles since then. She faced a big enough task at the outset - helping Labour recover from the shock of the election defeat, leading an effective opposition to the new SNP government and building up the party ready to challenge for power again.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 27 th March 2008.

'Then along came the leadership campaign donation controversy, and in particular a £950 contribution from Jersey businessman Paul Green. He was not legally allowed to donate as he is not a UK voter. It was a paltry sum compared to the amounts at stake in funding rows affecting Labour at UK level, but it virtually paralysed her leadership while the Electoral Commission spent more than two months investigating it, before deciding not to report her to the fiscal. No sooner was that resolved than she was plunged into a new controversy, when unhelpful comments from Westminster colleagues undermined her cross-party initiative to look at more powers for Holyrood.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 27 th March 2008.

'One internal critic says: 'The MSP group seems to be united behind her, but the membership is not. They never got to vote for her in the first place so they don't feel any affinity. Many of them are still not happy about the donations issue; they feel she has done something wrong.''
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 27 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has let slip that the party machine is gearing up to fight the election in 2010, when the five-year maximum term is up.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 28 th March 2008.

'You, conversely, will be in a hole you didn't see coming, and as miffed - this has become the current yardstick - as Wendy Alexander was yesterday.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 28 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander said her first six months as leader, which have featured investigations into an illegal campaign donation, have taught her lessons.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 28 th March 2008.

'The leaderships of Gordon Brown and Wendy Alexander have failed to make the political weather and instead have seen the party north and south of the Border retreat further and become less sure of its mission and purpose.'
Gerry Hassan in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'A former Labour Minister has launched an outspoken attack on the party's flagship policy of a constitutional commission on new powers for the Scottish Parliament. Brian Wilson has derided the idea as Wendy Alexander prepares to re-launch her leadership at the Scottish Labour Conference in Aviemore.'
Bernard Ponsonby on STV News, 28 th March 2008.

'Scottish Labour Leader Wendy Alexander has come under fire from inside her own party for 'prattling on' about constitutional change. Former Labour Scottish Office Minister Brian Wilson accused her of doing the SNP's job for them by setting up a Commission on more powers for Holyrood.'
Ian Swanson in the Evening News, 28 th March 2008.

'I fail to understand why the people who have created Labour's difficulties in Scotland seem to learn nothing and keep on making the same mistakes.'
Ex Scottish Office Minister and Labour MP, Brian Wilson, 28 th March 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander has denied she wanted to see a power grab in which Holyrood would lose significant powers to Westminster.'
The Guide and Gazette, 28 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander has given herself a perfect score in her performance as Scottish Labour leader. She awarded herself a '10 out of 10', while saying it was time to move on from the donation scandal which hit her leadership campaign.'
BBC Scotland News, 28 th March 2008.

'I think she fluffed her lines. She probably meant to award herself £995 out of 1,000.'
Christina de Kéroualle in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'Brown is expected to offer praise for Scots Labour leader Wendy Alexander. Her supporters are hoping his speech will help unite the party after a bruising time since losing the election. Alexander has clashed with Labour councillors, MPs at Westminster and union leaders since taking over from Jack McConnell last summer. And her first months in the post were dominated by revelations her leadership campaign accepted an illegal £950 donation from a tax exile. She has also failed to impress at Holyrood. Her job is secure for now thanks to Brown's backing and the lack of an obvious successor. But, privately, MPs and MSPs have raised questions about her long-term future.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 28 th March 2008

'Wendy Alexander has experienced a torrid first six months as Scottish Labour leader. Taking over last summer following Jack McConnell's resignation, she inherited a party still bitter from its first electoral defeat for a generation.'
Hamish MacDonnell in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'She set about trying to reform her party, get it used to being in opposition, and one of her first acts was to go to the UK Labour conference and apologise for the election defeat. But then she became mired in a row over an illegal £ 950 payment to her leadership campaign fund, a controversy that escalated, threatening to bring her brief career as a party leader to an abrupt end.'
Hamish MacDonnell in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander did suffer from back-biting and internal criticism over her attitude and approach in the Holyrood chamber, with some Labour MSPs feeling she was being beaten by Alex Salmond every week. Her decision to focus on small, apparently unconnected, events each week fuelled the impression that she was struggling. '
Hamish MacDonnell in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'Ms Alexander has had a turbulent time since taking the reins of her party. Soon after taking over it emerged that her leadership campaign received a £950 donation - illegal because it came from jersey-based businessman Paul Green, who is not a UK voter. Asked in the webcast if she was a crook, the Paisley North MSP replied: 'I have said all along a mistake was made, £950 was accepted by one of my campaign team, it shouldn't have been - it was handed back.'
BBC Scotland News, 28 th March 2008.

'When you look at the faces of the Scottish Labour benches in Holyrood since last year, you see a party struggling to accept reality. Labour MSPs sit ashen-faced, by turns angry or despondent, looking over to the SNP sitting in the government benches and thinking that they are sitting in what are 'their seats by right'. The party has become the embodiment of 'the Scottish tut'. This is centred on the belief that you have the right to tell strangers off, go in the huff and throw your weight about to get your own way. In short, this is the equivalent of a middle-aged tantrum.'
Gerry Hassan in the Scotsman, 28 th March 2008.

'Tensions within the party surfaced on the first day of the conference yesterday when former senior party figure Brian Wilson branded as 'nonsense' Alexander's high-profile moves to give Holyrood new powers.' Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 29 th March 2008

'Wendy Alexander yesterday used her first conference speech as Labour leader to insist she would counter the SNP with 'socialist' policies. She told delegates at Aviemore that Labour would tackle the 'right-wing' Nationalists from the left. But her speech was nearly upstaged after new rows blew up over party funding and comments allegedly attributed to her spokesman. A minute from Alexander's constituency party claimed her team ran a 'shambolic' re-election campaign last year that ran up 'serious debts'. Her press aide, Simon Pia, also had to clarify remarks he made about presiding officer Alex Fergusson.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'Alexander's speech was overshadowed by further questions over campaign finance. Her early months as leader were dogged after the Sunday Herald revealed her campaign had been funded by an illegal donation from a Jersey tax exile. Now, a document passed to the Sunday Herald - a minute of a meeting of her local constituency party - reveals Alexander's Holyrood re-relection campaign was also poorly run.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'The meeting of the Paisley and Renfrewshire North constituency Labour Party, dated September 28 last year, and attended by Alexander, read: 'Terry Kelly as election agent for Wendy Alexander noted that some aspects of the campaign run well others were fairly shambolic sic. It was noted that there were problems co-ordinating the campaigns between Paisley North and South and that measures need to be introduced now to prevent this hampering future campaigns.' It added that the CLP had" some serious debts which needed to be cleared as a matter of priority' .'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'Last night a spokesman for Labour leader Wendy Alexander failed to respond to requests for comment.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th April 2008.

'Her new press aide, Simon Pia, was also dragged into a bizarre row over comments he allegedly made about presiding officer Alex Fergusson. Labour MSPs are unhappy about the performance of Fergusson, whom they believe is too soft on First Minister Alex Salmond at First Minister's Question Time. Pia said of Fergusson on Thursday: 'Some say he's a big, thick Tory toff teuchter, but I don't think so.' Alexander's spokesman said the quote reflected the fact that he was not saying the presiding officer was incompetent.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'Beneath the scripted tributes at conference lies a party unwilling to view Alexander's leadership with much enthusiasm. A large part of the queasiness, according to delegates approached by the Sunday Herald, relates to Alexander's focus on internal reform and constitutional change.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'A contest last year could have saved Alexander from the inevitable failure that awaits her at some point during the next four years. But her campaign lieutenants instead made sure a challenge was impossible by mopping up support from nearly all Labour MSPs. The result was that, rather than Scottish Labour holding a Democratic-style leadership contest, Alexander assumed one of the top jobs in Scottish politics without her ideas being tested.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'All Wendy is doing by raising the scarlet standard high is trying to consolidate the Labour 'base' in Scotland - the core vote that still believes in social democratic values. It is a cynical exercise in focus-group politics; a risible attempt to portray Labour as the party of the people, of equality and collective security.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 30 th March 2008.

'Wendy Alexander is on a kamikaze plunge by piloting the party head on into the constitution - a subject which is an utter turn off to most of the public but meat and drink to the nationalists. Most of her MSPs are useless and the party's in a mess. On Friday, the conference reverberated to the sound of furious lobbyists and visitors who had been made to wait for three hours to receive their passes. Labour: the Terminal 5 of political parties.'
Eddie Barnes in the Scotsman, 30 th March 2008.

'Alexander's speech comes seven months after she took over the party following Labour's defeat in last year's Scottish elections. Her leadership was thrown into crisis after it emerged that she had wrongly accepted an illegal donation from a Jersey-based businessman, in breach of electoral laws.'
Eddie Barnes in the Scotsman, 30 th March 2008.

'A donor to Alexander's leadership campaign denounced her commission as 'appeasement' of the SNP. Baron Moonie of Kirkcaldy, a former defence minister who gave £500 to Alexander last year, said that instead of proposing big changes, she ought to be trying to stabilise the current devolution settlement.'
Tom Bell in the Sunday Times, 30 th March 2008.

'For Moonie, the best tactic for Alexander is to hold tight, not panic, and wait out the storm until the 2011 elections. But by then, Brown may be out of power in Westminster, support for independence may be on the rise in reaction to David Cameron, and Alexander will have had her chance and blown it.'
Tom Bell in the Sunday Times, 30 th March 2008.

'Jim McCabe leader of North Lanarkshire council and head of the Labour group on the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, said Alexander had to drop her 'superior attitude' and listen to the party's grassroots.'
Tom Bell in the Sunday Times, 30 th March 2008.

'No matter how hard she tries, Alexander seems unable to hold the initiative. Her good week at Holyrood was undermined on the first day of conference when she awarded herself a '10 out of 10' rating on her first six months as leader. An e-mail from her spin doctor Simon Pia in advance of her speech yesterday suggested she should model herself on Martin Luther King and John F Kennedy. 'The 10 out of 10 thing was a catastrophic error,' said one party insider. She should be going back to basics, not borrowing stuff from JFK.'
Tom Bell in the Sunday Times, 30 th March 2008.

'What Wendy Alexander didn't say in Aviemore turned out to be rather more interesting than what she actually said. Her first conference speech as leader did not once mention her Constitutional Commission. Since this is her flagship policy - her one distinctive contribution to Scottish Labour politics - this is intriguing to say the least.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 31 st March 2008.

'So, socialism is the solution is it? The first reaction to Wendy Alexander's determination to turn the clock back and portray Alex Salmond's Nationalists as Right-wing ogres is that it is as daft as it is desperate. In a speech at her party's Aviemore conference that was obviously designed to shore up her still tenuous position atop Scottish Labour, the lady forgot about the world outside the narrow confines of the hall.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 31 st March 2008.

'The Nats are also being traduced for their business-friendly policies. But wait a minute, isn't Wendy Alexander a former enterprise minister and didn't Labour in government witter on continuously about encouraging small businesses?'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 31 st March 2008.

'Pretending that the Nats are Right-wing nutters while at the same time pretending that demanding more powers for Holyrood is not playing their game, shows pretty poor political judgment on Ms Alexander's part.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 31 st March 2008.

'Wonky looks awful pleased - do you think she's found the missing £5?'
Clarinda in the Herald, 31 st March 2007

'Alexander did not explain how Keir Hardie would have championed the private sector in the health service, the Iraq war or bloated class sizes. These Labour policies were the reasons the SNP won last year's Scottish elections. Anyone wanting socialism on either side of the border is not going to find it within New Labour.'
Socialist Worker, 1 st April 2008.

'That Wendy Alexander gave herself ten out of ten in a webcast self-appraisal really is amusing. This is someone who would contend they are in touch with reality.'
Brian Hennigan in the Evening News, 1 st April 2008.

'A spin doctor who quit after he was caught with a hooker in his car has been brought back as an adviser to Wendy Alexander. Philip Chalmers plunged Donald Dewar's administration into crisis when he resigned over the scandal in 2000. But he now has a trusted role as an unofficial adviser to the Scottish Labour leader.'
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 1 st April 2008.

'Wendy seeks people with particular skills and he provided that.' (Unattributed quote)
Magnus Gardham in the Daily Record, 1 st April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was yesterday embarrassed by a Labour-supporting newspaper highlighting her links to a former adviser who quit in disgrace.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 2 nd April 2008.

'Yesterday's front-page exclusive - headed, 'Wendy Turns to Vice Scandal Spin Doctor' - will not endear the Daily Record to the Labour faithful.'
Allmedia Scotland, 2 nd April 2008.

'Ms Alexander is warning colleagues to stick to the line she agreed with the Westminster leadership. She is angered that the row risks a wedge being driven between the party's two parliamentary groups, offering an opportunity for nationalists to exploit.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 2 nd April 2008.

'On another front, Wendy Alexander continues to have troubles with her advisers. The Labour leader woke yesterday to read the following headline in the normally Labour-supporting Daily Record: 'Wendy Turns to Vice Scandal Spin Doc.' It related how she's been seeking advice from one Philip Chalmers, who'd resigned from Donald Dewar's employ in 2000 after being found by police with what was described as a 'hooker' in his car. Mind you that's not how the lady in question described the vehicle. Not recognising it as an expensive people carrier, Mr Chalmer's companion had described it at the time as 'a van wi' windaes'.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 2 nd April 2008.

'Both Mr Brown's speech - and that by Wendy Alexander as Scottish Party leader at the conference next day - have come at a time of great flux for the party in Scotland. For generations, the party's hierarchy has been able to take for granted support at the polls from their heartland constituencies in Scotland but last May showed that is no longer case - especially when it comes to Holyrood.'
Strathspey Herald, 2 nd April 2008.

'I have been a Labour supporter for many years, but it appears to me the party are contributing to their demise with controversial decisions, such as the appointment of Philip Chalmers as adviser to Wendy Alexander. There is no doubt Wendy does not have the quality or stature to be leader of the Scottish Labour Party, and it will continue to spiral downward unless there is an extensive shake-up.'
E. McLeod in the Daily Record, 5 th April 2008.

'Wendy will have to do much better to convince those who have deserted Labour to come back. She should look to the SSP or Solidarity to find core socialist principles. Wendy may have given herself 10 out of 10 for her leadership performance but she still has a long way to go to win Labour's once loyal voters back.'
Elaine C. Smith in the Sunday Mail, 6 th April 2008.

The SNP and Alex Salmond are winning more support all the time. Latest polls show them miles in front of Wendy Alexander's struggling Labour. If there were an election tomorrow the SNP would actually gain more seats - quite a feat for a party in power. The First Minister has every right to be satisfied.'
Sunday Mail Editorial, 6 th April 2008.

'One of Scotland's leading economists and the husband of the Labour leader at Holyrood has condemned the Chancellor's treatment of the Scotch whisky industry.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 9 th April 2008.

'Chancellor Alistair Darling has been damned over his whisky tax rises - by the husband of Scots Labour leader Wendy Alexander. Professor Brian Ashcroft, a top economist, blasted the 10 per cent rise on spirits that Darling brought in in his Budget last month.'
The Daily Record, 10 th April 2008.

'While Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander tries to hold the Union together in the face of the SNP's separatist onslaught, it hasn't stopped her husband having a go at the Treasury for the 'damaging' above-inflation increase.'
Mark McLaughlin in the Evening News, 10 th April 2008.

'Last year Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander came under fire after it emerged she had not declared cash donated for her leadership campaign.'
Caireen Kelly in the Hamilton Advertiser, 10 th April 2008.

'I'm so glad that Wendy Alexander's husband, Professor Brian Ashcroft, has broken ranks and added his voice to underline the fact that the Chancellor's whisky-duty hike had nothing to do with tackling binge-drinking and everything to do with propping up the UK's failing finances.'
SNP MSP Rob Gibson, in the John O'Groat Journal, 11 th April 2008.

'In 2000 Wendy Alexander boasted that the introduction of the 10 pence tax rate would put more money in women's purses. She and her MSPs must now say where they stand on its abolition. If their rhetoric about progressive taxation means anything surely they would join with backbench Labour MPs who have accused Gordon Brown of living on another planet for scrapping the 10 pence rate. Hundreds of thousands of people who can least afford this tax increase will find themselves paying more in tax and for food to keep Wendy Alexander's leader happy.'
SNP MSP Kenny Gibson, 12 th April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, the leader of the Scottish Labour group, must be wondering whether there's really any point in coming back from holiday this week.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 13 th April 2008.

'McConnell's uneasy relationship with Wendy Alexander MBA (Insead) was misread as a Labour hack's discomfort with 21st century management science. Her technocratic reputation made her the toast of the business breakfast circuit and enshrined her among suits and influential commentators as queen over the water. Her non-participation drained further credibility from McConnell's friend-of-business stance. Now that disorganisation (her own) and dishonesty (Charlie Gordon MSP and others) has forced Alexander's reinvention as La Pasionara of Paisley North, McConnell's unflashy managerialism and dogged integrity look more impressive.'
Colin Donald in the Sunday Herald, 13 th April 2008.

'Unfortunately, Brown has been an unmitigated disaster for Labour in Scotland, and not just because of his reputation as a ditherer. He installed his protege Wendy Alexander - without an election - as leader of the Scottish party, and plunged Labour into its worst crisis since the resignation of Henry McLeish as first minister in 2001. Alexander was supposed to be the fresh new face of Labour, but she has emerged as a deluded opportunist who claims to be 'socialist' while getting caught up in a row about illegal donations from property developers; who mounts campaigns against cuts in services even as her mentor, Gordon Brown, was cutting the funding to pay for them.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 14 th April 2008.

'Brown's recent threats to cut off council tax benefits and to overrule the Scottish parliament's power to introduce local income tax were politically inept. This just allowed the SNP to paint Labour as neocolonial governors and defenders of the hated council tax. The increase in whisky duty in the budget was so unpopular that even Wendy Alexander's husband, the economist Professor Brian Ashcroft, condemned it.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 14 th April 2008.

'Perhaps we should have forecast that his (Gordon Brown's) protege, Wendy Alexander, would be further disaster for Labour in Scotland - though I certainly didn't. She seemed to represent the way forward for Scottish Labour: female, intelligent and open-minded about constitutional reform. But she has mounted campaigns against cuts in services even as her mentor, Gordon Brown, cuts the funding to pay for them.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Herald, 15 th April 2008.

'Whether Wendy Alexander has a workable and more palatable scheme up her sleeve remains to be seen, but judging by the back-of-an-envelope plan for new council tax bands announced by Jack McConnell before the election, she would do well to steer clear of devising an alternative and instead stay on the offensive against the SNP's flawed proposals.'
Evening News editorial, 16 th April 2008.

'In 2000 Wendy Alexander boasted that the introduction of the 10 pence tax rate would put more money in women's purses. It's abolition is putting more money in Wendy and her MSPs purses.'
Kenny Gibson MSP, 17 th April 2008.

'At today's First Minister's Questions in the Scottish Parliament, Wendy Alexander asked the first 2 of her 3 questions (getting swatted by Alex Salmond as usual), then announced that 'she had no more questions for the First Minister'. Puzzled looks and gasps on all sides. Alex Salmond got up to reply, but the Presiding Officer ruled that since there wasn't a question there was no need for a reply. Since Wendy is such a friend of Gordon Brown could it be that the line from Washington went down and she didn't know what to say?'
Iain Dale, 17 th April 2008.

'She could have asked 'Which part of Scotland is Jersey in?'.'
Daily Referendum, 17 th April 2008.

'Our whisky distilleries such as Ord, Teaninich, Dalmore, Invergordon, Glen Morangie and Balblair pay the price of misguided untargeted Budget increases. Even Wendy Alexander's husband, Professor Brian Ashcroft, has broken ranks, saying that the Chancellor's whisky duty hike had nothing to do with tackling binge drinking and everything to do with propping up the UK's failing finances.'
Rob Gibson MSP in the Ross-shire Journal, 18 th April 2008.

'The Sunday Herald's Scottish political editor, Paul Hutcheon, was crowned journalist of the year at the 29th annual awards, held in Glasgow. Hutcheon also won for scoop of the year for his story on the Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, and the donation she received from a tax exile.'
Stephen Brook in the Guardian, 18 th April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander may well believe that a re-commitment to socialism, as she pledged in her own party's conference speech two weeks ago, is the best way forward but it is difficult to see many voters agreeing with her.'
Alan Cochrane in the Telegraph, 19 th April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's latest swipe at the SNP is cringeworthy. It speaks volumes about the Labour Party itself. Still bereft of ideas and still unable to reconcile itself to last May's election results, the best it can do is speculate that the Nats figures won't add up in three or four years.'
Fraser Crawford in the Herald, 19 th April 2008.

'I'm sure I'm not the only one who marvelled at Wendy Alexander's ability to keep a straight face when she said at her party conference that Labour was a socialist party. It certainly gave us a laugh but as jokes go it was a pretty sick one. Labour's idea of fair taxation is retaining the unfair council tax and doubling the rate of income tax for the lowest paid people in the country. Gordon Brown's axing of the 10p tax rate has left more than half a million Scottish households worse off. Anyone earning less than £17,000 a year will pay more in tax. Delegates, that's not socialist. That is scandalous.'
Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon MSP, 20 th April 2008.

'One of Scottish Labour's most senior figures has stated that independence should be one of the options considered in any debate on constitutional change. Steven Purcell, leader of Glasgow City Council, said the SNP's priority was 'legitimate' in the context of considering changes to the Scottish Parliament. His stance contradicts the view of Labour's Holyrood leader Wendy Alexander, who does not believe independence should be part of any review of devolution.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 20 th April 2008.

'The Scottish branch of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCSU) will call for full separation from the UK to be placed on the agenda of the Scottish Trade Union Congress so it can be properly discussed. The call is a major embarrassment for Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander, who earlier this year set up a commission looking at the Scottish Parliament's powers but insisted that independence be excluded as an option.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 20 th April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander once called foul over this waste, but now - as opposition attack-dog - all wider issues have been forgotten in the stampede to land a blow against the enemy. But so scatter-gun and hysterical is Labour's approach over SNP 'cuts' that they are already losing their bite.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 20 th April 2008.

'Say what you like about Wendy Alexander - and everyone does.'
Kenny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 20 th April 2008.

'Nationalists today welcomed comments from a leading Labour politician that independence had its place in the future constitutional debate. Glasgow city council leader Steven Purcell's position will further 'isolate' Labour leader Wendy Alexander, the SNP claimed. She has been a driving force behind a commission into the constitutional future and a review of the powers of the Scottish parliament. But this will not look at independence.'
The Herald, 21 st April 2008.

'Ridding high in the polls, Alex Salmond's actively courting ordinary trade union members. The SNP's pursuing policies close to their hearts - not least their opposition to the war in Iraq, to Trident and to private finance deals. As for Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader can only hope traditional bonds endure - she can ill afford to lose union support.'
Jamie Livingstone on STV News, 22 nd April 2008.

'Wendy Alexander is making a serious mistake in removing options from the debate and not recognising the Scottish people's right to self-determination. If you don't have confidence to win the argument then you have no right to be in the debating chamber.'
Eddie Reilly, Scottish secretary of the PCS Union, 23 rd April 2008.

'Alex Salmond won a bigger round of applause than Wendy Alexander at the STUC conference in Inverness yesterday.'
Daily Record Editorial, 23 rd April 2008.

'Twenty years ago, a teacher could compile a list of offences that would lead to automatic suspension. Nowadays, that list would be smaller than a Book of Great Speeches Made By Wendy Alexander.'
Hugh Reilly in the Scotsman, 23 rd April 2008.

'Labour's Wendy Alexander chose to pursue Mr Salmond with accusations he led a 'special access government'. He denied the charge. On another day, this might have been a useful exchange on the nature of political power. Today, with the break-down in the Grangemouth talks to the fore, it was the wrong call.'
Brian Taylor, BBC News, 24 th April 2008.

'Still, if the Liberal was foolish, Labour's Wendy Alexander was near-baffling.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 25 th April 2008.

'Labour could do with a strategy, not least given Ms Alexander's own brushes with rules and regulations. But was yesterday really the day to unleash an innuendo or three? I could be wrong, but when a country's only refinery is being shut down, the talk on the forecourts is unlikely to centre around codes of ministerial conduct. You don't have to join Mr Stephen in the escape pod to realise that wayfarers on the M8 might be a little preoccupied.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 25 th April 2008.

'Their measured exchange must have left Labour-voting folk wondering about Ms Alexander's priorities. What Liberals thought about Mr Stephen's approach is, not for the first time, beyond me.'
Ian Bell in the Herald, 25 th April 2008.

'At least she asked about Grangemouth. Wendy Alexander, the Labour leader, avoided it altogether. In an odd decision, at a moment of national crisis, she decided to ask Mr Salmond about something entirely different: the question of whether his administration gave special access to favoured individuals at the expense of ordinary people. You could see her reasoning. To ask about Grangemouth was to invite a series of statesmanlike responses, with very little chance to score points. Why not catch him unawares on an issue he may not have been expecting? It didn't work. Instead it allowed Mr Salmond to tease her about ignoring the issue of the day, and made her, by contrast, look small-minded.'
Magnus Linklater in the Times, 25 th April 2008.

'Is the reason that Alex Salmond is getting his own way so easily because he is up against the bookish Wendy Alexander, Auntie Annabel from the knitting bee and the anonymous Nicol Stephen?'
Brian Monteith in the Scotsman, 25th April 2008.

'Whenever I watched McConnell on television, he was always talking down to young people like me. They never gave you the impression that they could make positive things happen, it was all nanny-state stuff and that's insulting to young people,' said Mathers. 'I don't always agree with Salmond - I'm not sure we need all these extra policemen, for instance - but he has authority and a confidence in Scotland which I find refreshing. In comparison, that Wendy Alexander [the Scottish Labour leader] gets on my nerves. Does she know how to do anything without screeching?'
Neil Drysale in the Observer, 27 th April 2008.

'Six months ago Labour leader Wendy Alexander's spin doctor Matthew Marr resigned after shouting a four-letter word at First Minister Alex Salmond during the Politician of the Year awards, while a subsequent spin doctor, Gavin Yates, was found to have criticised Ms Alexander and Labour in his personal blog.'
Gerry Braiden in the Herald, 29 th April 2008.

'In an interview, Ms Alexander admitted her leadership had got off to a poor start. For months she was dogged by controversy over a £950 donation to her leadership campaign fund. And she has repeatedly been embarrassed at First Minister's Questions, where she has struggled to handle the cut and thrust of the chamber and has been often treated with disdain by Mr Salmond.'
David Madox in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd May 2008.

'This week, deputy SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon stood in for Mr Salmond, and ambushed Ms Alexander, describing her as 'inept and desperate'. And last month Ms Alexander even failed to ask a final question, leaving the First Minister in fits of laughter.'
David Madox in Scotland on Sunday, 3 rd May 2008.

'With Wendy Alexander's new-found support for a referendum on independence, I prefer more precise terminology. It is driven, I reckon, by calculation and fear.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland News, 5 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander's mates in the Calman Commission - which only began work last week - are entitled to feel somewhat sore.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland News, 5 th May 2008.

'Tories are angry. They say Wendy Alexander is seeking a way out of her own and her party's woes - and is prepared to risk the Union in the by-going.'
Brian Taylor, BBC Scotland News, 5 th May 2008.

'But if Ms Alexander's uncharacteristically aggressive response was calculated to strike fear in her Nationalist opponents and inspire confidence in her party colleagues and Unionist allies, there was little sign of that working last night.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 6 th May 2008.

'Ian Davidson, MP for Glasgow South West, said he was 'surprised' by the timing of Ms Alexander's announcement. And one Labour MP asked if Ms Alexander 'was off her head', adding: 'What is she thinking?'.'
David Maddox and Gerri Peev in the Scotsman, 6 th May 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander has been attacked by her her Unionist allies as she announced proposals for a referendum on Independence. It seems Ms Alexander, who insists it is time to flush out the SNP, is also struggling for the support of the Prime Minister Gordon Brown.'
Michael Crow on STV News, 6 th May 2008.

'Asked repeatedly whether the Prime Minister supported Wendy Alexander's call for a referendum on Scottish independence, the PMS said that the Prime Minister's position on the matter was that clearly there was a debate taking place in the Scottish Parliament on the timing of any potential referendum on Scottish independence. The Prime Minister had always been confident of the strength of the argument in favour of the Union and believed that a referendum on Scotland leaving the Union would be defeated. Asked when the Prime Minister found out about the comments made by Wendy Alexander, the PMS said that the position taken by the Labour Party leader was a matter for her, but obviously the Prime Minister did speak to his Labour Party colleagues, including the leader of the Labour party in Scotland, all the time.'
Briefing from the Prime Minister's Spokesman, 6 th May 2006.

'Gordon Brown publically distanced himself from Wendy Alexander's new policy towards an independent referendum yesterday.'
Michael Settle and Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 7 th May 2008.

'Roll up, roll up for Wendo, the amazing one-woman circus act. Thrill as she performs a U-turn with double twist on the political high wire. Gasp as she spins on the trapeze, just avoiding an accidental slip that could make Scotland independent. Shudder as she fearlessly places her head in the jaws of fiasco. Scratch your head as you try to figure out what on earth she's playing at.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 7 th May 2008.

''There's enough of the huff, the puff and the bluff,' she said, coming over all tabloid and macho, but also reverting to her liking for the politics of children's stories. A speech last year featured The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and now it was the Three Little Piggies' turn - apparently forgetting that the Big Bad Nationalist Wolf huffed and puffed and succeeded in blowing down several flimsy houses until the Labour porkers got their act together.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 7 th May 2008.

'I'm not sure if Wendy Alexander is trying to get rid of Gordon Brown or Gordon Brown is trying to get rid of Wendy Alexander.'
First Minister Alex Salmond, 7 th May 2008.

'Labour implodes over independence vote.
Shambles for Alexander after confused statement on referendum.'
Scotsman front page headlines, 8 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander is promising to 'harry' the first minister. For now, he looks decidedly less than harried.'
BBC Political ditor, 8 th May 2008.

'Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander insisted she had no plans to quit last night after rival parties said her position on the independence referendum was 'untenable'. The claim followed exchanges at Prime Minister's Questions where Gordon Brown failed to give public backing to her call for an early referendum on independence.'
Metro, 8 th May 2008.

'A day of extraordinary disarray within Labour has left serious questions hanging over the party's leadership on both sides of the Border. Days after Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader, called for a referendum on independence, Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, directly contradicted her when put on the spot at Westminster yesterday.'
David Maddox and Ross Lydall in the Scotsman, 8 th May 2008.

'As news of Mr Brown's comments at PMQ's spread, Ms Alexader went to ground.'
David Maddox and Ross Lydall in the Scotsman, 8 th May 2008.

'Last night, the Scottish Labour leader was left desperately defending her position.'
David Maddox and Ross Lydall in the Scotsman, 8 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander quits. Again unlikely since she has shown no sign of being willing to relinquish her job in the wake of donation scandals and ineptitude in parliament.'
David Maddox in the Scotsman, 8 th May 2008.

'In a development of staggering ineptitude, both Gordon Brown and Wendy Alexander now appear to have embarked on a desperate dissemblage to erase Ms Alexander's words from the public domain and pull what they can of the Labour Party's credibility out of a now raging blaze.'
Scotsman editorial, 8 th May 2008.

'This morning, Ms Alexander's position - whether it is the one she had last week, the one she abandoned on Monday, or the old one she is now attempting to regain - looks untenable.'
Scotsman editorial, 8 th May 2008.

'The position of the Prime Minister is scarcely any better. Either he was badly briefed ahead of PMQs yesterday or he was desperately seeking to distance himself from Wendy Alexander's verbal acrobatics.'
Scotsman editorial, 8 th May 2008.

'Given the progress made by Wendy Alexander in the past few days, who knows what side she'll be campaigning on?'
First Minister Alex Salmond MSP MP, 8 th May 2008.

'She is either incredibly disloyal or incredibly stupid.'
Piers Morgan, BBC Question Time, 8 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander, Labour's leader at Holyrood, renewed her call for an early referendum - just 24 hours after Mr Brown sought to craft a unified position which had denied that is what she wants. It provoked one Westminster party colleague to describe her as 'a political suicide bomber'.'
Michael Settle and Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 9 th May 2008.

'In five short days Ms Alexander has boxed Labour, and a Prime Minister who wraps himself in a Union flag, into a countdown to an independence referendum.'
Torcuil Crichton in the Herald, 9 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander's cunning plan backfired on both herself and Gordon Brown in their respective parliaments.'
Torcuil Crichton in the Herald, 9 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander yesterday confirmed the rift that has opened up with Gordon Brown over her support for an independence referendum.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 9 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander was mocked when she said: 'I am not the problem. Labour is not the problem'.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 9 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was called on by Labour colleagues last night to step down as leader of the party at Holyrood as her brother Douglas Alexander, made clear he supported Gordon Brown and the UK government's line on an earlyindependence referendum.'
Michael Settle and Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 10 th May 2008.

'This is the worst of all possible worlds. We have marginalised the Calman Commission (the body studying more powers for the Scottish Parliament), confused the Scottish public, taken the Liberals and the Tories out of the equation and seemed more enthusiastic than the SNP to have a referendum. Labour supporters and activists will find it difficult to work out what on earth is going on. It's hard to understand how Labour could get itself into this position. What about the public? They have been treated with contempt.'
Former Labour First Minister of scotland, the Rt Hon Henry McLeish, 10 th May 2008.

''A week,' so the saying goes, 'is a long time in politics.' But after this week, it must be time to coin a new catchphrase. For 72 hours clearly deserves recognition too. Three days, we have learnt, can turn a U-turn from a policy change to utter calamity and confusion. It can pit colleague against colleague, party against party and it can turn a well-known Unionist stance into one of utter bewilderment. What went on this week in the minds of two senior Labour politicians - one the prime minister and the other the supposedly close colleague he helped get into office - will possibly only ever be known when their memoirs come out.'
Tim Reid, Westminster reporter, BBC Scotland, 10 th May 2008.

'When the Nationalists took control at Holyrood it was presumed that the biggest rifts, rows, splits and divisions would be caused between the SNP government and the Labour government at Westminster. But no, what this week has proved is that the biggest row between London and Edinburgh so far has been between Labour colleagues.'
Tim Reid, Westminster reporter, BBC Scotland, 10 th May 2008.

'We have this week seen ministers 'incandescent with rage' whilst others have wandered around with their heads in their hands at the whole referendum debacle which Wendy Alexander sparked last Sunday. Almost unprompted, senior Labour figures at Westminster have been quick not just to condemn or to criticise their Scottish colleague, but to pull'out the daggers without apology. One senior minister said of Ms Alexander: 'Her leadership has been a car crash. This is the worst crisis so far for her, and she's a gift to the SNP.' But this senior Labour figure didn't stop there. He went on to accuse Gordon Brown of misrepresenting the Scottish leader's views, Wendy Alexander of misrepresenting his views and as a result leaving no-one in the party with a clue what their policy was.'
Tim Reid, Westminster reporter, BBC Scotland, 10 th May 2008.

Monday
My secretary asks if I want a coffee. I say 'bring it on', and she does. Then the phone rings. It's my brother Douglas. I'm the leader of the Labour Party in Scotland. He's the Secretary of State for International Development. We're a very impressive family.
'How's Burma?' I say. 'Bugger Burma,' says Douglas. 'What's this you've been saying about a referendum on Scottish independence? Gordon has been giving me hell.' I frown. 'You? What has it got to do with you?' Douglas says that he's not sure the PM realises that we are two different people. Either way, Gordon is very confused. He's not sure whether I want a referendum or not.
'I said, 'Bring it on'.' I say. 'It should be obvious.' 'Nothing is obvious for Gordon,' says Douglas. 'You know what he's like. He's decided that 'bring it on' means you don't want one. Probably because he doesn't want one. I think you are due a bollocking.' I give a grim little laugh. 'Bring. It. On,' I say. 'And you can tell him I said that.' 'He won't understand,' says Douglas. 'You'd better call him.'
Tuesday
Nobody understands. I don't know why.
It's perfectly simple. The Scottish Nationalists want independence, and we don't. So, they want a referendum, and we don't want a referendum. But, although we don't want a referendum, we reckon that if there is one, we want it soon, so that people are more likely to want what we want them to want. Which is to say, not to want anything.
So, in saying that we want one now, we want the SNP to say that they don't want one now. And they will, because they want to get what they want. And that's what we want. Because, if they have one when they want, they might get what they want. And who would want that?
I don't know why Gordon is confused. He must be some kind of idiot.
Wednesday
I still haven't managed to get through to Gordon. Eventually, he calls me.
'Douglas,' he says. 'No,' I say. 'What?' says Gordon. 'Never mind,' I say. Gordon lapses into a panicked silence. 'Bring it on?' I say carefully. 'Yes!' says Gordon, who has called to explain that, actually, 'bring it on' means that I don't want a referendum.
'But Gordon,' I tell him. 'I do.'' No, Douglas,' says Gordon. 'You don't.' 'I'm Wendy,' I remind him.
'No you aren't,' says Gordon.
Thursday
You've got to be careful with Gordon. It's not that he means to be difficult. It's just that he doesn't understand it when people don't think what he thinks. So he tells everybody else that you think what he thinks, even when you don't. And they believe him.
'Coffee?' says my secretary. 'Bring it on!' I say, but she just wanders away. See?
It's First Minister's Questions at midday today, so I have a showdown with Alex Salmond. At about 9.45am, I ask him to meet me for lunch. It's cunning. I'm messing with his mind.
'Now?' says Salmond. 'I've just had breakfast. Why would I want lunch at 9.45am?' 'Aha!' I say.' So you are ruling out the possibility of lunch?' 'Well, aye,' says the First Minister, sounding baffled. 'I'll only want lunch later. At lunchtime.' 'Hypocrite!' I say. I can run rings around this man.
Friday
Gordon calls again. 'Douglas?' he says. 'We need to talk about Burma.' I know he's the Prime Minister, but I finally snap.' I'm not Douglas!' I say. 'I'm Wendy!' 'Wendy?' says Gordon.
'Alexander,' I say. 'I'm Gordon,' says Gordon. 'I know that,' I say. 'No you don't,' says Gordon.'
My Week: Wendy Alexander.
By Hugo Rifkind in the Times, 10 th May 2008.

U turn if you want to!
The Lady is for turning!

'Shouldn't she be in a pond somewhere spawning at this time of year, with a mouth like that?'
Reflett on YouTube, 11 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was last night forced into a humiliating climbdown over her call last week for an early referendum on Scottish independence. Labour's Holyrood leader yesterday appeared to ditch her new-found support for an immediate referendum and backed away from supporting one. The U-turn points to prime minister Gordon Brown 'having read the riot act' to Alexander and overruling her on the issue of a fast-tracked poll, opting for a barely credible show of unity rather than a split between Edinburgh and London.'
James Cusick and Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'Bitter briefing by both camps intensified, with Alexander aides calling Brown 'a ditherer', while Brown's team dismissed Alexander as a 'political pygmy'.'
James Cusick and Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'A senior Labour MSP said: 'People are now talking about Wendy resigning. It's a question they are asking. Everyone is demoralised.' Another Labour MSP said: 'Enough is enough. She has to go.' However, another friend of the embattled leader said of Brown: 'A lot of people at Holyrood and at Westminster are not happy with him.' A second said: 'The problem is Gordon's a ditherer.' A third source who is close to Alexander said of Brown's aides: 'They just don't give a f*** about Scotland. All they care about is the next general election'.'
James Cusick and Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'Her U-turn, one of Scottish Labour's biggest constitutional gambles in its history, was made without the knowledge of her shadow cabinet, the party executive, Downing Street or even her own advisers. Alexander's comments have also had the effect of setting in train some of the most chaotic and confusing scenes within Scottish Labour for decades.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'An awful day for Alexander then got worse when it emerged that her idea for a Labour referendum bill would breach the parliament's standing orders. Thursday only added to the confusion. Alexander again defied Brown by saying she wanted an early referendum, while her aides appeared to retreat from Tuesday's position by refusing to endorse McNeil's view that Labour would not vote down any referendum.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'When Wendy Alexander faced Alex Salmond at First Minister's Questions in Holyrood and repeated her support for an early referendum on Scottish independence, the anger level inside Number 10 is said to have been off the scale. One aide close to Gordon Brown described Alexander as 'reckless'. Another called her 'a selfish and stupid individual' who 'hasn't got a clue when it comes to understanding the consequences of what happens when she opens her mouth'.'
James Cusick in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'Days later, when Alex Salmond was running rings rounds Alexander in Holyrood and evidently enjoying the self-inflicted turmoil in Labour ranks both north and south of the Border, Labour's MPs in Westminster are said to have begun wondering if a private decision they had taken on Tuesday night to 'fall in behind her call for a referendum' was necessarily the right one, given the turmoil they were now witnessing.'
James Cusick in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'For ministers and senior party figures, offering up prayers that Alexander will walk before being pushed, there is only one question: if Wendy goes and has to be replaced ... how could anyone do a worse job?'
James Cusick in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'It has been, by common consent, Wendy Alexander's worst week since she became leader, worse even than the row over her dodgy donations. She began it defying Gordon Brown by calling for an early referendum on independence, making it look as if the prime minister had lost control of Scotland; she ended it with a humiliating U-turn, pretending she didn't really want a referendum after all. The press has pronounced sentence of political death.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'She has now destroyed what credibility she had left by agreeing to yesterday's abject U-turn and by pretending that she hadn't been serious about calling for a referendum in the first place. The whole exercise has only confirmed that Labour in Scotland simply cannot go their own way, at least under Alexander. That in the end, Labour in Scotland does what they are told and are unable to speak for themselves, let alone speak for Scotland.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Sunday Herald, 11 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was yesterday forced into a humiliating U-turn on a public vote on Scottish independence. She dropped plans to launch a referendum bill on the orders of a furious Gordon Brown.'
Mark Aitken in the Sunday Mail, 11 th May 2008.

'Former First Minister Henry McLeish said: 'We have had a year of ineffective opposition by Labour while the SNP have confidently governed Scotland and their support has risen. We don't look like a competent opposition and the events of the past week won't have helped that'.'
Mark Aitken in the Sunday Mail, 11 th May 2008.

'First Minister Alex Salmond has been accused of being smug and self-satisfied. After Labour's performance during the last week, he has every right to be.'
Sunday Mail Editorial, 11 th May 2008.

'As the dust temporarily settles on one of the most surreal weeks in Holyrood's nine-year history, a new landscape emerges filled with gaping, and previously unimaginable, splits. There is the rift between Alexander and Brown. There is an open feud between Scottish Labour MSPs and the rest of their stunned, gob-smacked party.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'Allies of Alexander's are blunt. 'Gordon can't make a decision and people have just got so fed up with it. This was just another decision he wasn't willing to make. She basically decided, well f*** you, I've got to do something,' said one.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'In what amounts to the ultimate insult, it appears that attacks from Salmond will be guarded. 'Alex didn't want to go too hard on her,' said an SNP spokesman, reflecting on last week's First Minister's Questions. 'It's better she stays where she is'.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's leadership of Scottish Labour has been like watching a car crash in slow motion. She has skidded from the crisis over dodgy donations to embarrassing performances in the Scottish Parliament, which confirmed Alex Salmond's superiority, and now to a potential national disaster over a referendum on independence.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'It is unthinkable that a policy U-turn on an issue as serious as the future of the United Kingdom should happen as a result of a knee-jerk spasm by one person on a TV programme. Yet that is what has happened. Not only did Alexander brazenly flout the authority of the Prime Minister - she did not consult her party colleagues at Holyrood or Westminster, nor the UK Ministers responsible for Scotland and the constitution. Nor did she consult the Scottish Labour party executive (now reduced to a committee of castrati) and certainly not her party members.'
Tom Brown in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'For the nationalists? Alexander has delivered them a decade's worth of Christmas presents. They are within touching distance of a dream no minority administration would expect to become reality.'
Sunday Herald Editorial, 11 th May 2008.

'Until now, it was easy to brush aside half-hearted calls from Nationalists for a referendum on Scottish independence. In future, the Nationalists will exploit at convenience the memory of how a Labour leader in the Scottish Parliament declared in favour of a referendum - but was rendered impotent by a Labour Prime Minister. They could scarcely have been handed a more welcome gift.'
Former Labour Scottish Officer Minister the Rt Hon Brian Wilson in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'The biggest loser from this fiasco is Wendy Alexander, and the next few days will reveal whether she can survive in her current role, or indeed if she wants to. She committed the cardinal sin of thinking out loud on television and her failure to envisage the impact and implications remains puzzling.'
Former Labour Scottish Officer Minister the Rt Hon Brian Wilson in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'At the very moment when the Prime Minister might have been assuming that the news could get no worse, Ms Alexander, 44, his hand-picked leader of the Scottish Labour Party, dropped one of the biggest political clangers in years. Standing on its head years of carefully finessed official policy, 'Bendy Wendy' called for a referendum on full Scottish independence. 'Bring it on,' she demanded. The riposte from almost all quarters was 'Get her off'.'
William Langley in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'Under the patient tutelage of the country's first First Minister, she prospered swiftly, becoming an MSP in 1999 and landing a ministerial post soon afterwards. Yet the doubts persisted. Many saw her as power-crazed, arrogant, sycophantic, abrasive and in too much of a hurry to think difficult problems through. 'She has a Shergar of an intellect and the common sense of a rocking horse,' complains one disgruntled colleague. People in the Scottish executive talk in injured tones of being 'Wendied', and the nickname 'Alexander the Grate' pursues her.'
William Langley in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'It all looked so promising for the Alexanders. Two countries, one vision, and both of them in charge. As Brown fumes and the storm clouds swirl around their heads, they will, at least, always have each other.'
William Langley in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'Why do all the hacks in Christendom refer to this pair as highly intelligent? They have the charisma of plankton and the political nous to go with it.'
John Gates in the Sunday Telegraph, 11 th May 2008.

'Labour MPs' real objection to Alexander's U-turn is that it opens up the prospect of the Scottish electorate voting them out of a job.'
Kenny Farquharson in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'WANTED: masochist.
Essential: ability to withstand weekly humiliation at hands of smuggest man in Scotland; proven track record of herding gormless sheep.
Desirable: willingness to accept title of 'leader' when actually taking orders from real leader, several hundred miles to the south; ability to withstand e-mails from said proper leader at 5am demanding to know why country of birth no longer likes him.
Terms and conditions: approximately 168 hours a week; no holidays, apart from Sunday 'brainstorming' sessions in North Queensferry. Applications to Scottish Labour, John Smith House, Glasgow. Applicants who can supply their own press officers will be treated favourably.'
Eddie Barnes in Scotland on Sunday, 11 th May 2008.

'To all but Gordon Brown, a fun few minutes could be spent last week watching selected extracts of Prime Minister's, followed by First Minister's, Questions. 'Wendy Alexander says that there should be a referendum now on Scottish independence. Does he agree with her?' asked David Cameron. 'That is not what she said,' replied Gordon Brown. And then a day later, here's Alexander herself: 'I have offered Labour's support for an early referendum.' How much humiliation can the Prime Minister take?'
Ruaridh Nicoll in the Observer, 11 th May 2008.

'What no one expected was a gamble when Labour is at its weakest, and especially not for the disgraceful reasons that seem to be driving Wendy Alexander.'
Ruaridh Nicoll in the Observer, 11 th May 2008.

'Alexander has left Brown, her close ally, in pain. Given how badly he has been let down by Wendy's brother Douglas (the 'election that never was' was pushed heavily by Douglas), Brown could have been forgiven for wishing he had never heard the name Alexander. But you get the feeling Wendy hasn't done herself any good either. The SNP leadership are laughing. They really are - I've heard them.'
Ruaridh Nicoll in the Observer, 11 th May 2008.

'It's hard to avoid the conclusion that Alexander is prepared to gamble the future of the Union to save her career. That's a terrible indictment.'
Ruaridh Nicoll in the Observer, 11 th May 2008.

'Could Simon Pia, spin doctor to Wendy Alexander, be losing the plot? After Wendy was cut adrift by Gordon Brown over her referendum wheeze, Pia endured a 'monstering' from Holyrood's press pack, as he tried to fend off questions in a sweltering corridor. Pia later claimed one hack was 'misogynist' for daring to criticise Wendy, and accused another, who like Alex Salmond is a Hearts fan, of having his nose stuck up the first minister's 'sweaty Jambo a***'. A born diplomat, clearly.'
Atticus in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was under pressure to resign last night after she issued a statement reversing her U-turn on an independence referendum. The Labour leader was said to have been described as 'mad' by her predecessor Jack McConnell ahead of the humiliating climbdown that threatens to bring her party to its knees. She has also been criticised by Henry McLeish, the former first minister, and John Prescott, the former deputy prime minister.'
Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'In the worst week of her political career, Alexander was accused of treachery by other unionist parties and infuriated Gordon Brown, her political mentor, after she unilaterally abandoned Labour's long-held opposition to a vote on separatism.'
Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'McConnell, a former Labour first minister and boss of Alexander, has told friends that he thinks she is 'off the wall'. 'He isn't surprised that this kind of thing has happened. He sees this as all Wendy's madness and him [Brown] being unreasonable,' said one. 'He says Gordon was impossible to deal with and he regards Wendy as being off the wall. He thinks she's just not got any judgment.''
Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'Alexander's shambolic policy change coincided with a combination of circumstances. Labour had just lost 331 seats in council elections in England and Wales, while Boris Johnson had just become London mayor, amid some of Labour's worst polling figures for 40 years. North of the border, the SNP was enjoying record polling figures, suggesting it would gain 15 extra seats at Holyrood in the next election in 2011.'
Tom Gordon and Jason Allardyce in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'Calls for her head among senior Westminster Labour politicians have intensified, and she has been mocked as 'a car crash' of a leader. She has wiped 10 years off Alex Salmond, who can't stop smiling; she has created what looks like an irreparable rift with the Scottish Tory leader Annabel Goldie, and has become a new target for the Lib Dems' barbs.Yet such is her arrogance and her misreading of political realities that she believes the current row will blow over in a few days and the focus will then shift to the substance of the issue.'
Jenny Hjul in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'She is not now and never has been backed by the Scottish public - and without Brown she will have even less standing - however much her loyal stalwarts plead on her behalf. Interestingly, it is the Labour men who are out there for her this time - Malcolm Chisholm, Iain Gray, Duncan McNeil, George Foulkes; what has happened to the women - Jackie Baillie, Pauline McNeill, Margaret Curran - who defended her previous unintentional wrongdoings so vocally?'
Jenny Hjul in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'Through pig-headedness, she has placed not just her party and prime minister, but the Union in a perilous position. What was unthinkable a week ago now looks possible. Salmond himself must admire the way in which she has catapulted constitutional matters to the fore of political debate, here and in Westminster. So much for tackling those bread-and-butter issues, Wendy. But who cares about health or education or social justice when you have a career crisis?'
Jenny Hjul in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'This column has called for Alexander's resignation before on grounds too numerous to mention. Of course she should go now but as she won't of her own accord she must be pushed. Brown is still her boss - she is only the leader of Scotland's Labour group at Holyrood - and he must act like it. As to who might take over the Labour party in Scotland, boost morale, rebuild its reputation with the electorate and rehabilitate it as a serious vehicle of opposition, I hear Coco the Clown is not very busy'
Jenny Hjul in the Sunday Times, 11 th May 2008.

'During the debates on devolution in the 1990s the then Secretary of State for Scotland, George Robertson, declared confidently and memorably: 'Devolution will kill nationalism stone dead.' Not only has the Labour Party so far failed to shoot the nationalist fox but last week the leader of the party in Scotland, Wendy Alexander, to the consternation not only of the Prime Minister but of her unionist allies in the Holyrood Parliament, asserted the urgent need for a referendum on the issue of Scottish independence.'
Professor Tom Devine in the Independent, 11 th May 2008.

'Many people think the days of the union are numbered. Hardly a week passes without the international media contacting my colleagues and myself with questions as to why this 300-year relationship may be nearing its end. After all, they say, Scotland is currently governed by a party committed to ending the union; surely the next and more dramatic step cannot be far distant? Then there is the masterly performance of Alex Salmond since taking office as First Minister a year ago. He is the supreme and dominant political figure in Scotland. His government has pursued headline-grabbing initiatives at an unrelenting pace in health, education and justice as well as robustly defending Scottish interests against that other Scot in 10 Downing Street. The SNP administration has demonstrated that it can govern, and govern well.'
Professor Tom Devine in the Independent, 11 th May 2008.

'Stop Press, Exclusive Scoop, etc!! Wendy Alexander is set to announce a new challenge to the SNP about the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. Scheduled for 2014, she is to tell Alex Salmond to 'bring them on' - arguing that if the SNP is genuine in its enthusiasm for staging the Games in Glasgow, it should legislate for them to take place the year before then, in 2013.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 12 th May 2008.

'Rather than wait until a train wreck at the 2010 polls, and then figure out what comes next, why not start now? They might even avert disaster. They might also avert the post-election calamity that is Scottish Labour at Holyrood. Under Wendy Alexander, it is showing that waiting to lose an election only leaves more space for subsequent ineptitude.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 12 th May 2008.

'The Scottish Labour Party is no stranger to chaos and confusion - it has been exploring the outer limits of political misfortune for most of the last half decade. But nothing can compare with the sense of blank despair in Scotland's largest party at the wreckage hat has been wrought by the affair of Wendy Alexander's referendum.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 12 th May 2008.

'In the end, Gordon Brown forced Wendy Alexander to execute a humiliating U-turn and to agree a statement to the effect that she had only been calling on the SNP to hold a referendum, and had never intended to promote one herself. It was all a bluff, a tease. This was an insult to the intelligence of the Scottish electorate, because Ms Alexander had been all over the television and parliament saying that she wanted a referendum on independence, as matter of principle, to 'let the Scottish people have a voice' on this crucial issue.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 12 th May 2008.

'The political reality is that Wendy Alexander lacks the authority to defy Brown. She is not actually the leader of the Scottish Labour Party, just the leader of the Labour group of MSPs in Holyrood, and a pretty weak one at that. She has courted scandal over her campaign fund-raising from tax-exiles and has performed very poorly in her weekly exchanges with Alex Salmond at question time. She has little capital to draw on among Westminster Labour MPs, many of whom believe she is a liability.'
Iain Macwhirter in the Guardian, 12 th May 2008.

'The growing unease in Labour MSP circles is the latest development in an affair that has fast developed into a full-blown policy crisis for the party and led to serous criticisms of Ms Alexander's leadership qualities. There is still no sign of an outright move against her, although worried Labour MSPs believe that she is deeply tarnished, with one close colleague going as far yesterday as telling The Times that she is 'close to a busted flush'.'
Angus Macleod in the Times, 12 th May 2008.

'Two former First Ministers have slated Wendy Alexander over her call for an immediate referendum on independence. Henry McLeish attacked the Scottish Labour leader and said: 'This is the worst of all possible worlds.' Ms Alexander has also been criticised by other political figures as Prime Minister Gordon Brown made it clear he was 'not persuaded' of her strategy. But the fiercest comments came from Mr McLeish. He said: 'We have marginalised the Calman Commission (which was set up to review devolution powers), confused the Scottish public, taken the Liberals and the Tories out of the equation and seemed more enthusiastic than the SNP to have a referendum. Labour supporters and activists will find it difficult to work out what on earth is going on. It's hard to understand how Labour could get itself into this position. What about the public? They have been treated with contempt.''
Evening Times, 12 th May 2008.

'Labour have dropped plans to force a Holyrood vote on an independence referendum. Wendy Alexander was considering the move last week in a bid to embarrass the SNP. But a source said yesterday: 'I would not have thought there are any plans for that at this stage.' The move marks a further retreat for Scots Labour leader Alexander.'
Daily Record, 13 th May 2008.

'Politicians love to make things 'absolutely clear'. Their position, however opaque, is always 'absolutely clear'. They are never confused. Is that absolutely clear? Scottish Labour's position on an independence referendum scarcely fits that aim. Originally, it was what Sir Humphrey would call 'courageous'. Now it is decidedly gelatinous.'
Brian Taylor, BBC News, 13 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander bungled this policy U-turn from the start. There was a half-hearted announcement, a confused policy position and a series of shifts and manoeuvres throughout the course of a chaotic week, trying to get MSPs on board for a policy declaration none of them was prepared for.'
Hamish Macdonell in the Scotsman, 13 th May 2008.

'Unionists should beware. With a likely Conservative Government at Westminster, and a Labour Party emasculated by Ms Alexander's wilful inconsistency, the omens will be good for Mr Salmond. If he loses he will find some way of abandoning his promise that independence referendums are held 'once in a generation'. He will go on asking the question during a second term in power at Holyrood until he gets the right answer. This, then, is where Ms Alexander has placed the Union. In as parlous a position as it has been in 301 years. For that, and that alone, she should resign.'
Angus Macleod in the Times, 13 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's beleaguered shadow cabinet faces another tough dilemma tomorrow on how to respond to Lord Sutherland's follow-up report on free personal care for the elderly. All the other parties at Holyrood are likely to back a motion this week echoing Lord Sutherland's call for Westminster to hand back the £30m annually in attendance allowance (AA) seized back when Scotland went its own way on the policy six years ago. But with Gordon Brown yesterday signalling support for a new insurance-based model for the future of social care south of the border, policies are set to diverge and Ms Alexander will be put in a difficult decision during Thursday's Holyrood debate on the Sutherland Report.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 13 th May 2008.

'Cameron accused Labour of putting the union at risk over the issue of a Scottish independence referendum. Brown insisted there were no plans for a referendum despite Scottish Labour leader Wendy Alexander's challenge to the SNP for an early vote and accused the Tories of "playing politics". Cameron claimed the prime minister and Alexander were "the two most unpopular politicians on the planet".'
Yesterday in Parliament in the Guardian, 15 th May 2008.

'Fair game. It's become the new national sport, getting wired into Wendy Alexander. Everybody seems to be having a right old go. Finding anybody sympathetic towards her is like finding anyone in this city who wants the trams. I've never met the delectable Wendy. Never had the displeasure. For a long time I wouldn't have known her from Adam. But from most accounts she's not somebody you'd want to bump into in the Canongate. Not without a baseball bat.'
John Gibson in the Scotsman, 15 th May 2008.

'Mr Brown's intervention followed a torrid fortnight for Wendy Alexander, the Labour leader in Scotland, who has performed a series of U-turns on her support for an independence referendum and the timing of any vote. Labour MSPs, at a meeting on Tuesday, ditched her pledge that the party would not stand in the way of an SNP bill, which has yet to be tabled at Holyrood, to hold a referendum in 2010. Labour also backtracked from Ms Alexander's infamous call to the SNP to "bring it on" and hold a vote as soon as possible.'
Ross Lydal in the Scotsman, 16 th May 2008.

'In my opinion, Wendy Alexander is an embarrassment to herself and the Labour Party. Nothing she seems to do or say is of interest to the Scottish people. She should now stand down as leader and her sidekick Jackie Baillie should start listening to the people who elected her. She did nothing to stop the closure of the A&E department in the Vale of Leven Hospital, which was vital for this area.'
David Anderson in the Daily Record, 16 th May 2008.

'What a fankle Wendy Alexander got herself into last week. A perfectly simple idea - and a good one - that Labour should agree in principle to a referendum on Scotland's continued participation in the success story that is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ended up as a summersault after a back flip following a triple salchow. And it wasn't a pretty sight.'
Brian Monteith in the Evening News, 16 th May 2008.

'Salmond has managed to get both Edinburgh and Westminster to, as he puts it, "dance to a Scottish jig". Witness the stumbling performance last week of Wendy Alexander, the Scottish Labour leader, and Mr Brown, on the question of whether or not Labour is in favour of a referendum on independence.'
Editorial in the Independent , 17 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander's troubled leadership of the Labour party in Scotland has suffered another blow after her most senior adviser walked out after a row over her referendum U-turn. Mike Elrick, 41, has taken "annual leave" to think about whether he wants to continue working with Labour's Holyrood leader.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 18 th May 2008.

'Brian Lironi, an award-winning journalist who became a Labour spin doctor last year, quit within days of Alexander taking over as leader. Matthew Marr, who was Alexander's personal press adviser, then quit after shouting a four-word obscenity at First Minister Alex Salmond at an awards ceremony. Alexander's stint as a minister in the Scottish Executive was also marked by poor relations with her press team, one of whom was reported to have made a complaint against her.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 18 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was on the Mound yesterday to hear the PM's speech...but the pair seemed a little distant. They sat yards apart at the General Assembly and insiders say relations between the pair, once close allies, are frosty.'
Sunday Mail, 18 th May 2008.

'Wendy Alexander is out of touch with Labour grassroots opinion, according to a poll of local activists, which showed that two-thirds oppose a referendum on independence. A third of officials also say she should quit as party leader. Alexander has infuriated party members by deciding to support an immediate referendum and then changing her mind in the space of a week. Her position has been further undermined by speculation that Mike Elrick, her senior policy adviser, may resign over the fiasco.'
Jason Allardyce and Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 18 th May, 2008.

'Alexander appointed Elrick a week after she officially became Labour leader at Holyrood last September, on the same day as she named Matthew Marr as her personal spin doctor. Within eight weeks, Marr was forced to quit after calling Alex Salmond a 'c***' in a drunken outburst at an awards ceremony. Brian Lironi, Marr's predecessor, also quit after barely two months in the post, complaining that Alexander's 24/7 demands were intolerable.'
Jason Allardyce and Tom Gordon in the Sunday Times, 18 th May, 2008.

'The past fortnight has been one of the most confusing and comical the Scottish Labour Party has ever seen. The competence of Wendy Alexander and Gordon Brown has been questioned, as has their ability to have a conversation where they understand each other.'
Labour biographer Gerry Hassan in the Scotsman, 19 th May 2008.

'The party now faces the unavoidable truth that it really has to address some of the difficult issues it chose to duck last year when it decided to avoid a leadership contest and crown Ms Alexander leader. The events of the past fortnight have made her a lame duck. Her period as leader of Scottish Labour in Holyrood is clearly marked, and it is only a matter of time before she has to go. Alexander is not a politician, but a technocratic policy wonk with no real political touch or antenna, as the past two weeks have shown.'
Labour biographer Gerry Hassan in the Scotsman, 19 th May 2008.

'Labour MSPs and MPs still use over-the-top language and phrases about the Nats, such as "the politics of grudge and grievance", and last week, Jackie Baillie dredged up the fact that 30 years ago, the SNP voted to bring down the Callaghan government. Political parties always stereotype their opponents, but, to be effective, they have to have some basis in reality.'
Labour biographer Gerry Hassan in the Scotsman, 19 th May 2008.

'Former First Minister Henry McLeish has launched a devastating critique of Wendy Alexander's leadership of Labour in Scotland, accusing it of having "no road map and no signposting". Arguing in Holyrood magazine that the next two years are "not the time" for a constitutional referendum, he writes that the past few weeks have raised questions about what Labour stands for. He accuses Labour's Scottish leadership of saying what it is against but failing to spell out what it is for.'
Robbie Dinwoodie in the Herald, 20 th May 2008.

'It's not quite a revolt, but it's another sign of beleaguered authority, when backbench Labour MSPs table a plan that would force Wendy Alexander to accept a front bench team elected by the whole party group. Elaine Smith and Bill Butler, MSPs who are leading figures in the Campaign for Socialism group, are seeking to win a vote at the group's annual general meeting on 24 June that would introduce elections to the shadow cabinet. At present, the group leader can choose her team.'
Douglas Fraser in the Herald, 20 th May 2008.

'Ms Alexander seemed to be performing the word dyspeptic as a Marcel Marceau mime. If looks could kill, this woman would find work as a trained assassin.'
Iain Bell in the herald, 6 th June 2008.

'This newspaper takes no pleasure in the resignation yesterday of Wendy Alexander, the leader of the Labour group at Holyrood, although we have been advocating for months that she take this course of action. We believe she lost the moral authority to lead the Labour group when she broke two separate laws governing politicians' financial affairs.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'Her resignation speech raises important issues for Scottish politics and civic life which warrant a response. First, she claims unjust treatment because she had sought advice from the standards clerks and been told that the donations to her leadership campaign need not be declared. This is a disingenuous argument. By the time Alexander and her team sought that advice they were already in breach of the law. They had accepted the donations and had not asked about the need to declare them until after the 30-day deadline for doing so had elapsed. The ruling by standards commisioner Jim Dyer that the law had been broken is absolutely correct.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'Team Alexander had broken the law governing donations in another and possibly more significant way, by accepting a donation from a tax exile. Not only that, the donation had been wrongly attributed to a UK-based company, Combined Property Services. It remains difficult to understand how any member of Alexander's team could have believed this contribution was corporate rather than individual, when neither the company nor the individual concerned had indicated that was the case.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'It is also worth pointing out that Wendy Alexander's team had deliberately sought donations just under the sum which would legally have required public disclosure. That is not in itself against the law, but it does suggest a cynical use of the rules to avoid transparency. The laws in question had been introduced by the Labour government at Westminster for reasons it presumably considered important enough to justify new legislation. It is a bit rich to plead persecution when that legislation is subsequently enforced.
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'Alexander and her allies go on to suggest that holding politicians responsible for following the laws they themselves introduce will somehow dissuade high-calibre candidates from entering public life. They suggest that calling politicians to account is somehow undermining the authority and public standing of the parliament itself. This newspaper believes the opposite is the case.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'Alexander is right in one respect. The publicity surrounding her actions has diverted attention away from many serious problems afflicting the lives of people in Scotland. If politicians are serious about restoring that balance, the answer is simple: don't break the law.'
Sunday Herald editorial, 29 th June 2008.

'"This is actually a good outcome for us" a former Westminster Labour minister told me as Wendy Alexander delivered her resignation statement on Saturday morning. Well, politicians are supposed to put a brave face on adversity, but seeing silver lining in the resignation of Labour's second Scottish leader in less than a decade over expenses irregularities - the first being the former First Minister Henry McLeish over those constituency sub-lets - was a towering achievement of political optimism. What I suspect he meant was that Labour could at least blame the SNP for Wendy's downfall. That it was the result of a politically motivated stitch-up by the nasty nats and their stooges like, er, the Scottish Standards Commissioner, Jim Dyer - who might have his own views about the accusations of political bias.' Iain Macwhirter in The Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Wendy Alexander: The resignation statement in full: "It wisnae me!"'
Los Angeles in The Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Ironically, it was the very leadership campaign that propelled Alexander into office that contained the seeds of her own downfall.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Last August, at a time when the Paisley North MSP was widely expected to succeed Jack McConnell as leader of the Labour party, Team Alexander decided to raise a war chest on the off-chance that another Labour MSP might mount a challenge. Her key lieutenants - campaign manager Tom McCabe, Whitton as treasurer, as well as Baillie and fellow Labour MSP Charlie Gordon - held regular meetings that dealt with fundraising and strategy, but made two fatal errors. The first was wilfully seeking donations of between £995 and £999, sums that suspiciously fell just below the Electoral Commission's public declaration level of £1000. The other decision was to create a body called the Wendy Alexander Campaign, effectively a bank account that stored the money raised from the secret donors. By seeking donations to the campaign, rather than to the MSP herself, Team Alexander believed the contributions would not have to be declared on the parliament's own register of interest. In other words, Alexander's leadership campaign was structured in such a way that public disclosure, at both commission and parliamentary level, was unnecessary.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Team Alexander's actions were subsequently exposed in a series of investigations by the Sunday Herald that were given wind in separate inquiries into her campaign fund. Her decision to accept an illegal £950 from Jersey-based businessman Paul Green overshadowed the first three months of her leadership and led to an inquiry by the Electoral Commission. Although the watchdog declined to report Alexander to the procurator fiscal, the body did conclude that she had broken the law, a damaging fact for any politician.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'But running parallel to the commission's investigation, which had attracted the attention of the UK media, was a much less high-profile probe by Dyer. In December last year, at the height of the Green controversy, an SNP researcher wrote to the commissioner and urged him to investigate whether Alexander had broken Holyrood's rules by not declaring the campaign donations as gifts. Dyer looked at the matter and, within weeks, concluded that Alexander had broken the rules on disclosure, a report he referred to procurator fiscal. Although the prosecutor decided it was "not appropriate" to press charges against the Labour leader - a decision that appeared to close down the donations row - Dyer resumed his investigation with a view to issuing a report to the Standards Committee.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'A donations row that had lain dormant for four months then flared up two weeks ago when the Sunday Herald revealed the contents of Dyer's report to the committee: in his view, a clear breach of the law had taken place. The seven MSPs on the committee were then tasked with deciding whether to accept his findings and, if it did so, agreeing a sanction for Alexander. A 5-2 majority decision last week backed Dyer's conclusion, which was followed by a narrower 4-3 decision last Thursday recommending a one-day suspension. More damagingly, the committee's extended deliberations meant the full parliamentary vote could not take place until September: the donations row would hang over her for another two months.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Alexander's final hours in charge were, according to one Labour insider, a "messy and horrible" affair. She had opted on Thursday night to resign as party leader, a decision Whitton and Baillie tried to overturn in frantic meetings at Labour HQ the following day. A manic 24 hours saw Alexander being pulled in both directions after the duo insisted she could continue as leader and fight the ban. Baillie, in particular, was keen for her to stay, a desire some party sources believe was motivated by a desire to retain her own position within the party as the leader's eyes and ears. However, perhaps influenced by her husband, Alexander tendered her resignation to Scottish Labour general secretary Colin Smyth yesterday morning, and read it out at a press conference before noon.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Her defiant statement, in keeping with her past defence, went to some lengths to pass on the blame for her problems. Despite breaking the law on declaring donations to the commission, Alexander claimed at the time that she had been "exonerated", a bizarre and self-serving interpretation of the facts. This time she blamed the SNP. The Nationalists, she claimed, were responsible for "vexatious complaints" to the standards commissioner, and had "sought the prize of political victory with little thought to the standing of the parliament". Her defence against the verdicts of the commissioner and the Standards Committee - that she was told by the parliament's clerks that registration was not unnecessary - was as weak as it was irrelevant. Alexander had asked for advice from the clerks in November last year on the status of her donations, 60 days after some of the campaign cheques had been banked, despite the law clearly stating that MSPs have 30 days to declare gifts. Put simply, Alexander asked for advice on registration well after she had already broken the rules, a fact that rendered any feedback from the Standards Committee as worthless.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'However, while the protracted donations scandal has forced Alexander's resignation, a number of other issues contributed to the perception that her leadership was in trouble. A series of shambolic performances at First Minister's Questions, coupled with the botched handling of her policy rethink on Scottish independence, gave the impression of a limping leader whose hold on power was far from secure.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Her nine-month stint also alienated colleagues who were among her staunchest supporters in the early days of her leadership. McCabe, her campaign manager, had distanced himself from Alexander months before the Standards Committee verdict. Duncan McNeil, the chair of the Labour group at Holyrood, was said to have turned down a senior post in Alexander's shadow administration, for reasons unexplained. Even her Westminster allies, namely the prime minister and her brother Douglas, the international development secretary, were furious with her over the referendum debacle.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'By the end, her dwindling band of supporters could be found in a small room in John Smith House trying to give Alexander's leadership the kiss of life. Yesterday she ignored their advice and turned off her own life support machine.'
Paul Hutcheon in the Sunday Herald, 29 th June 2008.

'Other than her closest political and personal pals, it is not unfair to Wendy Alexander to say that the people who will really miss her are Alex Salmond and the Scottish National Party.'
Angus Macleod in the Times, 29 th June 2008.

'Wendy Alexander was advised that donations to her Scottish Labour leadership campaign should be declared, it has emerged. The guidance, from a Holyrood official, came out in the official report into a complaint about her campaign donations.
BBC News, 10 th July 2008.

'The row over former Labour leader Wendy Alexander's departure re-ignited today over the publication of a Holyrood report. It claims officials did tell Ms Alexander that she may be required to register donations with parliamentary authorities for her ill-fated party leadership campaign.'
The Herald, 10 th July 2008.

'Just a few months ago, Wendy was leader of the Labour Party in Scotland and, as such, was viewed as one of THE political heavyweights north of the border. But a 'dodgy donations' row led to her resignation - leaving her with more time to concentrate on constituency matters in Paisley North.'
Andrew Newport, in the Paisley Daily Express, 27 th October 2008.

Wendy Alexander's Finest Moments

'There will be those of you asking, who is Wendy Alexander Is she as rubbish as Alan Cochrane claims Is she as small as she looks Is she really worth bothering about I cannot claim to be able to answer any of those questions, but what I can do is pass on this piece of cruelly doctored footage which captures what it is like to listen to a speech by Wendy. Fast forward to 0.55.'
Iain Martin in the Guardian, 7 th February 2008.