Nicola Sturgeon says she will ‘get on with life and my job’ after husband’s arrest

Nicola Sturgeon said she would “get on with life and my job” after her husband was arrested before being released without charge in connection with an investigation into the SNP’s finances.

Speaking outside her home near Glasgow, the former First Minister said in a brief statement that the last few days were “obviously difficult” after the arrest of Peter Murrell, the party’s former chief executive.

Ms Sturgeon said she understood “the scrutiny that comes on me as a public figure”, adding that she intended to “get on with life and my job as you would expect”.

The statement was Ms Sturgeon’s first since police arrested Mr Murrell and searched their home on Wednesday morning. Investigators have also searched the SNP’s headquarters in Edinburgh.

Nicola Sturgeon speaks to reporters on Saturday - Jane Barlow/PA

She said there would be “full cooperation” with the police investigation, but added that she could not comment on it “as much as there are things I may want to say”.

“The last few days have been obviously difficult, quite dramatic at times, but I understand that is part of a process,” she told reporters.

Ms Sturgeon stood down from her role as first minister in February and has since been replaced by Humza Yousaf after a ballot of SNP members.

In her resignation statement, she said it was “right for me, for my party and for the country” to stand down after nine years in the post.

Her resignation and the police investigation have thrown the SNP into turmoil, with the SNP’s president describing it as “the biggest and most challenging crisis we’ve ever faced”.

The investigation into the party’s finances relates to a £600,000 pot that had been earmarked for independence campaigning. On Friday, Johnston Carmichael, the SNP’s auditors, quit as police investigated the whereabouts of the money.

Sources warned that Ms Sturgeon’s silence over the investigation was becoming a “festering wound”, and Mr Yousaf admitted the SNP’s governance was “not as it should be”.

On Thursday, he said it had been a “difficult 24 hours” after the news of Mr Murrell’s arrest broke less than two weeks into his tenure as SNP leader.