Achi news desk-
Hugh Harkins gave £5,000. However, there were legacies worth £246,000 and £4,000 respectively from the estates of two recent supporters, Estelle Brownrig and James Murdoch.
Meanwhile, accounts published last August show the SNP has made a loss of more than £800,000 in 2022, the second biggest deficit the party has recorded.
READ MORE: Operation Branchform report goes to prosecutors in weeks
Money from subordinate members of the SNP membership fell from £2,516,854 in 2021 to £2,286,944 in 2022.
While reportable donations fell over the same period from £695,351 to £368,538.
When asked about the state of the party’s finances, the First Minister said that the SNP would “obviously have to raise money from our supporters” in order to ensure a “well-funded election campaign”.
Mr Swinney told BBC Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland: “Don’t worry about the money, we’ll find the money to fight the election campaign, we’ll get on with that.
“We have well-funded campaigns across the country and we will be raising money to make sure we fight a strong and enthusiastic election campaign that is about the fact that the future of Scotland damaged by decisions taken in Westminster.”
Operation Branchform was launched by Police Scotland in July 2021 after complaints that £660,000 raised specifically by the party for a second independence referendum campaign had been spent on other items.
Peter Murrell, the party’s former chief executive – who is married to former first minister Nicola Sturgeon – was re-arrested and charged in connection with the theft of money from the SNP last month.
Officers are currently completing what is known as a standard prosecution report, detailing their findings and setting out their evidence.
READ MORE: Scots Publishing tycoons give ‘serious’ campaign donations to MPs
During the interview, Mr Swinney also hit out at Rishi Sunak for calling the General Election during the Scottish school holidays.
On Wednesday night, the Prime Minister announced that the vote would be on July 4.
Most schools in Scotland stop for the summer holidays in June.
Mr Swinney told the Good Morning Scotland program on BBC Scotland: “I don’t really think that the arrangements in Scotland for school holidays have been close to the calculations made by the First Minister.”
Asked if he would expect them to be, he said: “I think it would be respectful if that were the case but it is quite typical of the disrespect shown to Scotland that we are back – consideration by the Westminster establishment and especially the Conservatives. organization.
“What it means is that people who are going to be on holiday at the start of the school holidays at the end of June, beginning of July must organize a postal vote so that they can exercise their vote (right to) and that are participants in our democracy, so people have to implement that fairly quickly.”
He said the constitution would be central to the SNP’s campaign.
When asked if independence will still be on page one of the manifesto as promised by his predecessor Humza Yousaf, he told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme: “Well of course because independence is the answer to the all those issues, it’s the answer to austerity, it’s the answer to the cost of living crisis, it’s the answer to Brexit.
“Independence is the way for Scotland to get over these errors and the harmful decisions that have been inflicted on us by Westminster.
“Of course they are interconnected, of course they will be central to our election campaign because that is the way we can follow a different path to the damage caused by Westminster.”
Meanwhile, Pat McFadden, Labour’s national campaign co-ordinator, told BBC Good Morning Scotland that the party was “in good shape in Scotland.”
He added: “We’re not taking anything for granted, but the really critical thing is that the power of the vote in Scotland is to send much more than a message, to actually be part of sending a Labor government to Westminster.”
Asked if the party would do any deal if there was a hung parliament, Mr McFadden said: “We’re not doing any deals, the aim is a majority, we know that’s ambitious but we want to bring stability to the country and me. believes that voters in Scotland have a vital role to play in this regard.”
When asked if all the party’s candidates for the Scottish seats were in place, he said: “We may have some to choose but if there is something to be done we will do it in the next few days”.
Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said the party will “take the fight to the SNP”.
He told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme: “The Scottish Conservatives will take the fight to the SNP, beat the nationalists in key seats up and down Scotland and get the focus back on what people have been telling me on the doorstep for months. they want their governments to focus on them.
“It’s about improving our education system, investing in the NHS, it’s about growing our economy, creating good jobs, but they know in key seats that it’s going to be a very close fight between Conservatives Scotland and the SNP.
“If they support the Scottish Conservatives, their priorities will be at the forefront, if they support the nationalists it will be about independence.
“All parties have been urging the Prime Minister to call the election, he has now done so, we are going to the country on July 4 and in the next six weeks, I will be out with my candidates all over the a country that takes the fight to the SNP in these key seats because they know the local priorities in their constituencies.
“They know voters are fed up with John Swinney and the SNP’s obsession with independence.”
