Nicola Sturgeon is smeared as a secret Tory backer

The Daily Telegraph has reported the contents of a confidential government memorandum which gives a third-hand account of a meeting between Nicola Sturgeon and the French ambassador to the UK in February of this year. The memo was drawn up by a civil servant based upon a telephone call with the French Consul-General who reported what he had been told by the ambassador.

According to this memo, Sturgeon said that she preferred Cameron to Miliband because she did not see the latter as being all that prime ministerial.

Sturgeon has denied saying any such thing and all we have is a Telegraph report of a memo that was written by a man who was not in the meeting, either. That said, we can expect the Tory press to jump on this bandwagon with glee as will the Labour Party in Scotland.

Assuming that the memo is broadly true, Does it matter that Sturgeon has a higher regard for Cameron than she does for Miliband? It strikes me as being neither here nor there. As a politician she leads a party that hates the Tories and is willing to work with Labour. She will not wreck her party by doing anything other than working with Miliband, whatever her private reservations are about him.

That said, I am fascinated to learn that the British government has leaked a confidential government document with the aim of causing a rift within the SNP and helping Labour. The first I can sort of understand, even though it is pretty dodgy. However the second only gives credence to the claim that there is not much to choose between Labour and Tory.

All the more reason to vote SNP I would have thought. As for Sturgeon, she should feel rather pleased that she is now regarded as being so dangerous that she is worthy of an official Tory government smear.

Update, 11.55pm: A BBC reporter claims that the French Consul-General denies making any such claims in his telephone call with the British civil servant.