We know what former SNP chief Peter Murrell bought with 400,000 of embezzled funds. What I'd like to know is why | Gaby Hinsliff

Peter Murrell, former SNP chief executive and estranged husband of Nicola Sturgeon, pleaded guilty to slowly embezzling over 400,000 from the SNP. Much of the money was spent on designer luxuries and high-end consumer items, including multiple advent calendars, Lalique crystal salt and pepper grinders, Le Creuset cookware, and several Nintendos. The spending list suggests misuse of party funds on both small personal purchases and expensive goods, with boundaries between personal needs and party resources appearing blurred. Nicola Sturgeon offered limited explanation, stating she was deceived and that the marriage breakdown was traumatic. Murrell’s guilty plea removed the need for a trial, leaving motives largely unresolved.

"Peter Murrell, former Scottish National party (SNP) chief executive and estranged husband of former first minister Nicola Sturgeon, pleaded guilty this week to slowly embezzling more than 400,000 from the party to which they both devoted their lives and blowing much of it on designer luxuries."

"Three Fortnum & Mason advent calendars, seemingly priced for those to whom money is no object; a pair of incomprehensibly expensive Lalique crystal salt and pepper grinders; several hundreds of pounds' worth of Le Creuset; and no fewer than six Nintendos."

"Sturgeon can offer no answers, beyond pleading that she was as deceived as everyone else and that the subsequent breakdown of their marriage has been traumatic. Essentially, her story is that they had separate bank accounts, and that she was too busy running Scotland to question who paid for their 3,070 robotic lawnmower, or revamped home library."

"The only clue left is this almost tragicomic shopping list, from which two distinctive patterns emerge. The first is an either careless or entitled misuse of party money on small things parking tickets, bottles of the Avon Skin So Soft body spray that Scots swear repels midges oddly redolent of the 2009 Westminster expenses scandal, as though all boundaries between the couple's needs and the party's had become blurred."

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