EXCL Donald Trump’s resorts charged the Secret Service over £20,000 during his trip to Scotland earlier this year, with agents having to seek approval for 'exorbitant' payments in excess of US government-sanctioned rates. Me for @TheScotsman. Thread 👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… Records I obtained from the Secret Service via US FOI laws show that US taxpayers picked up a bill totalling $108,559 (£85,602) for Trump’s three day long trip to Scotland this May, where agents stayed at his resorts in Turnberry and Aberdeenshire.

Thread: Lots of interest in Trump's latest Scottish accounts, not least the fact that they show his firms here have received more money via UK government grants than previously known. His companies took in more than £3.8m via the job retention scheme during the pandemic.

https://twitter.com/MartynMcL/status/1621068408023547906

Of course, that didn't prevent Trump's flagship resort at Turnberry incurring the wrath of unions and ethics groups by making scores of redundancies during the pandemic, while receiving money from a scheme expressly designed to help firms pay employees unable to work.

EXCL Recruitment firms controlled by Lord Ashcroft, the billionaire Tory donor, have been paid £7m+ by @scotgov & £14m+ by Scotland's crisis-hit NHS since 2019. Ashcroft's firms received £40m+ from Scottish public bodies

My @scotonsunday story: scotsman.com/news/politics/… Thread👇 @scotgov @scotonsunday The scale of the commercial relationship between Ashcroft’s firms, the @scotgov, and its associated bodies is vast and, until now, unreported. It spans 79 public orgs who, since April 2019, have struck deals worth £41,444,874 with the former Tory treasurer’s companies.

EXCL: There needs to be “structural change” at the top of Scottish football’s governing body to ensure that the women’s game can continue its upward trajectory, according to the head of Scottish Women’s Football. scotsman.com/sport/football… Thread 👇 I spoke to @ClydesdAileen, the CEO @ScotWFootball and former SNP MSP and @ScotGov minister, about how Scotland can build on the interest and visibility in women’s football after England’s historic Euro 22 win.

EXCL: Women who wanted to have abortions during the pandemic continued their pregnancies due a chronic and longstanding lack of access to late-stage terminations across Scotland, a leading charity has warned. My @scotonsunday story. Thread 👇 scotsman.com/news/politics/… The absence of provision means women - and girls - are still being forced to travel as far as London in order to have terminations. Out of the 170 cross-border clients the BPAS charity treated between 2019 and 2021, five were under the age of 16. Some 18 were aged 17 or under.

EXCL: A Scottish company has been accused by officials in Washington of supporting Vladimir Putin's military and security services. The firm has been blacklisted as part of efforts to "degrade" Russia's military aggression. My @scotonsunday story: scotsman.com/news/politics/… While the vast majority of firms blacklisted by the US govt for supporting Putin's military are Russian, not all are. The Scottish limited partnership, Djeco Group, is one of three UK firms placed on the entity list.

.@NicolaSturgeon is right to call on firms to disinvest from Russia. But she may wish to take a closer look at some of the successful ScotWind bidders, whose ties to Moscow and its state-owned energy firms are numerous. My @TheScotsman column. Thread👇scotsman.com/news/opinion/c… The successful bidders in the first round of offshore wind leasing in Scottish waters for a decade were announced last month. At least six of those firms have investments and/or partnerships in Russian firms that are either state-owned, have ties to Putin

NEW: The New York Attorney General is scrutinising the finances around Donald Trump's Aberdeenshire golf resort as part of her long-running investigation into the Trump Org's "fraudulent or misleading" asset valuations so as to obtain loans and tax breaks. scotsman.com/news/national/… Letitia James's investigation is dissecting what are known as 'statements of financial condition' filed by Trump and his firm - essentially declarations of worth used in dealings with lenders, insurance firms etc

Another punt, and thread, about my exclusive report in today’s @TheScotsman on vast carbon footprint of the #COP26 summit, which is projected to pump around 102,500 tonnes of CO2e into the atmosphere 👇 scotsman.com/news/environme… The scale of the projected emissions is another level to those seen in previous COPs. In Madrid in 2019, the total was 51,000 tCO2e. In Paris in 2015, it was 43,000 tCO2e, and in Copenhagen in 2009, it was 26,000 tCO2e.

EXCL: A right-wing US climate denial think tank is to convene an ‘alternative’ summit in Glasgow during COP26. Environmental groups and climate experts have warned to expect misinformation, pseudoscience, and 'hardcore' climate denial tactics. scotsman.com/news/politics/… The upcoming ‘climate reality forum’ is being convened by the Heartland Institute, a hardline US org which has previously received funding from the fossil fuel industry. It is among the most vocal actors in the so-called global climate realism movement.

EXCL: Russian & US billionaire owners of luxury private members’ clubs are among a spate of wealthy foreign nationals whose Scottish firms claimed £ms in furlough payments. Trump’s firms claimed up to £1.54m despite making scores of redundancies. Thread👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… The Treasury’s job retention scheme was introduced last spring to support struggling businesses and prevent mass unemployment. With the initiative being wound up this week, I cross-referenced HMRC furlough payment datasets with Companies House records to dig into the £.

EXCL: Environmental groups have condemned emissions at the COP26 summit venues, which exceed 6,600 tonnes of CO2 a year. Two venues have the second lowest possible energy efficiency rating, with legally binding improvements yet to be carried out. Thread 👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… The UK Govt, which holds the COP26 presidency, describe the SEC buildings as “state of the art” - a characterisation energy assessors would struggle to recognise. The SEC conference centre and the Armadillo scored F on a sliding scale of A to G.

EXCL A video-sharing platform reported to regulators for hosting hateful, violent & anti-semitic content is seeing a surge in activity aimed at Scottish audiences, incl Covid-19 disinformation and extremists targeting BAME politicians. Me for @scotonsunday scotsman.com/news/politics/… The material on BitChute includes well worn QAnon conspiracy theories tied to Scotland's vaccine programme. One claims future mass fatalities from Covid-19 will be incinerated at Amazon owned facilities. Another claims 900+ Scots are dying a month due to vaccines.

NEW: Early individual constituency votes for regional lists indicate that Alex Salmond's Alba Party is on course for electoral oblivion, with a slew of other fringe parties failing to cut through with the electorate. My analysis for @TheScotsman #sp21 scotsman.com/news/politics/… In Aberdeen Donside, the party registered just 2.1 per cent of the list vote, and 2 per cent in Angus North and Mearns. Mr Salmond has put himself as Alba's top candidate in the NE list. If these numbers are replicated region-wide, it is not good news for the former FM.

EXCL Donald Trump’s flagship international resort claimed up to half a million pounds in UK taxpayers’ money via a Covid-19 job fund - despite making scores of redundancies during the pandemic. Union officials are demanding a govt investigation. Thread 👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… Trump’s UK firms have received as much as £575,000 via the UK Govt’s job retention scheme, though the data compiled and published by HMRC to date only spans Dec ‘20 and Jan ‘21, meaning the total claim is likely to be significantly higher.

EXCL: Donald Trump’s golf resorts in Scotland and Ireland charged the US Secret Service more than £17,000 for a series of previously undisclosed trips during his first full year in office. My story in today's @scotonsunday

scotsman.com/news/politics/… The Secret Service spending records were obtained via FoI by @weareoversight and passed to me. Austin Evers, the organisation's executive director, told me the Trumps continued to "line their pockets" with public money.

Here is my Insight longread for @scotonsunday on the implications of Greensill capital’s collapse for Sanjeev Gupta’s Scottish steel firms and, by extension, Scottish taxpayers. Thread👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… The potential exposure to the public purse could be circa £575m, due to the SG’s 25 year guarantee to Gupta’s Lochaber subsidiary, which will see the govt buy power its hydro plant generates in the event its smelter shuts down.

EXCL: The UK Government has been accused of turning COP26 into a “greenwashing platform” after partnering with a firm condemned by environmental groups for sourcing palm oil products from businesses accused of widespread deforestation activities. Thread👇
scotsman.com/news/politics/… Reckitt, the government’s latest ‘top tier’ sponsor of the upcoming COP26 climate change summit, may not be a familiar name, but it owns household brands like Dettol, Vanish and Nurofen. It uses more than 134,000 tonnes of palm oil products to make its goods every year.

EXCL: The SNP has been accused of spurning evidence-based policy after striking a £56m deal to renew its flagship baby box scheme two days before the pre-election recess - and before an independent evaluation of the initiative has been completed. Thread👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… The baby box is a widely popular and inclusive policy, but it’s sold as more than a feel-good initiative. The problem is there’s no evidence of how it’s helping address child health, poverty, inequality, or engagement with hard to reach families.

EXCL Children as young as 11 - under the age of criminal prosecution - are among 5,996 youngsters held overnight in police custody across Scotland since 2018. A leading children’s rights academic said children’s rights are being breached. Thread👇scotsman.com/news/politics/… These figures emerged following a carefully tailored freedom of information request I sent to Police Scotland, seeking breakdowns by age / location of children being detained in police custody. The fact this info isn’t proactively or publicly published is a prob I’ll return to.

A short thread on an interesting day covering the Holyrood vote on Trump: I'm perhaps more interested than most in obtaining answers to Qs surrounding Trump's finances. I never thought they'd arrive via a legislature, whether in Scotland or the US. Today confirmed that. The courts, whether via criminal or civil cases, is the likeliest avenue for transparency. The multiple cases involving Trump's firms may yet reveal that, but the progress is glacial.