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Nicola Sturgeon has claimed that she is “worried” about her estranged husband Peter Murrell as she dismissed speculation they were in a “lavender” marriage. The long-standing couple announced their split earlier this year, just a few months before he appeared in court charged with embezzling funds from the SNP.
The former First Minister has long denied any knowledge of this, and was arrested and questioned by cops investigating Operation Branchform. Their marital home was raided just two months after she announced she was stepping down from the top job due to being exhausted.
She has always firmly denied being tipped off by police that the probe was about to kick into higher gear, insisting her resignation was due to other factors. She does touch upon her feelings on the scandal in her book Frankly, describing her “utter disbelief” about what happened.
A passage reads: “With police tents all around it, it looked more like a murder scene than the place of safety it had always been for me. I was devastated, mortified, confused and terrified.”
READ MORE: Nicola Sturgeon left raging as she defends keeping £75k MSP salary despite barely speaking at Holyrood
Ms Sturgeon has given numerous interviews to promote her book, with her latest being with LBC host Iain Dale where she was asked about her current relationship with Mr Murrell who is awaiting trial on fraud charges. She said: “We communicate. Obviously I’m concerned about how he is, so from that point of view yes. I’m concerned about his wellbeing.”
And she claimed that they don’t discuss “anything of note” and refer to the court case as “the thing.” She said: “We don’t talk about ‘the thing’… That’s not what I call it… I possibly sometimes call it things that are less polite than that. I’m obviously concerned about his wellbeing so yes we do [talk] but not about anything of particular note.”
The couple has faced rumours that the relationship was “fake” as they were both gay and it had been a “lavender marriage.” It was laughed off by Ms Sturgeon who said: “That’s ridiculous. It was not a fake marriage. When we got together I thought he was the one. I loved him. I still do. People say all sorts of nasty toxic things.
“You accept a degree of this is inevitable but with me that kind of determination to pry into my personal life went beyond what it should have done. Part of the reason I’ve chosen to open up about my personal life in this book is because after that I want to try and redraw the boundary between the public and the private.
“I am just out of a lengthy marriage and a pretty torrid couple of years of my life. I’m enjoying being single and thats as far as I’m going to go right now. I was so focused on work when I was younger. I’m living a delayed adolescence. I’m not on Tinder, absolutely not. I wouldn’t even know how to get on it, can you imagine? I am not on Tinder, don’t come looking for me.”
Ms Sturgeon fuelled rumours that she was bisexual by writing in the book that she believes sexuality is not binary but has dismissed suggestions she is looking for a lesbian relationship at the moment.
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