First Minister Alex Salmond has been cleared of misleading the Scottish Parliament in a row over the funding of a religious body.
A report by former Presiding Officers George Reid and Lord Steel have hit out at the role of the Scottish Inter Faith Council (SIFC) in a Holyrood bust up between Mr Salmond and Liberal Democrat leader Tavish Scott.
The row between the Lib Dems and the SNP centred on whether Mr Salmond was wrong when he made a statement to MSPs on January 8 this year.
He said funding for the Scottish Inter Faith Council, amid redundancy fears, had been sorted out. Lib Dems, however, claimed it had not been resolved at that stage.
Mr Reid interviewed the First Minister and Mr Scott, as well as representatives from the council and the Scottish Government.
The report found that Major Alan Dixon, ex-convener of the SIFC, had been given - and welcomed - assurances over the group's funding by Community Safety Minister Fergus Ewing prior to the parliamentary clash and told redundancies would not be necessary. Mr Salmond was told about this three days before the Holyrood clash with Mr Scott.
"The First Minister's comments were made not only in good faith, based on advice given to him by the Minister for Community Safety on December 20 and January 5, but also accurately reflected the Scottish Government's official position on the issue," the report's conclusions state. The report also claims that the SIFC executive committee adopted a "high risk" strategy in its late withdrawal of redundancy notices.
"Some members of the Executive Committee chose to issue comments and briefings to people outside the decision-making process that were completely at odds with the understanding of the Scottish Government and the indications the SIFC had given to both the minister and government officials," the report adds.
Mr Salmond has welcomed the findings, which were published on Friday. "I am delighted with this outcome, and accept the report and its recommendation in full," he said. "I hope that those who raised complaints about this matter will have the grace to accept the report."
Mr Salmond ordered the report after a complaint was made by Mr Scott under the ministerial code. Holyrood's Standards and Procedures Committee is also separately looking into what can be done in cases where ministers or MSPs are accused of not telling the truth in the parliament, after the matter was referred by Presiding Officer Alex Fergusson in light of this row.
The report did conclude that the episode served as a reminder of the need for care in volunteering additional information in parliamentary debate. In response to the findings, Mr Scott said: "I said right at the start that I would accept the findings, and I do."
