Nicola Sturgeon: I'll never speak to Alex Salmond again

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has said she has no intention of speaking to her former mentor Alex Salmond ever again.

Last year Sturgeon was forced to give evidence before a committee of MSPs investigating the Scottish Government’s handling of allegations against Salmond.

The Scottish Government paid Salmond more than £500,000 in costs after its investigation of complaints was found to be unlawful at a judicial review.

The former SNP leader was cleared in 2020 of sexually assaulting nine women while he was first minister.

Sturgeon was later found to have misled the Scottish Parliament by the committee of MSPs.

During an event at the Edinburgh Fringe, she was asked by presenter Iain Dale whether she had been in touch with Salmond recently.

“Nope,” she responded.

“Do you think you ever will?” Dale asked.

“Nope,” Sturgeon said.

Meanwhile, asked if she was angered by comments made by Liz Truss that she should be “ignored,” Sturgeon said: “It didn’t make me angry on my own…but it kind of makes me angry on behalf of Scotland. Not everybody in Scotland supports me or my party – I recognise that. Some people will like me as a politician, others will loathe me.

“But I am the democratically elected First Minister of Scotland. When you say that I should be ignored, then effectively you’re saying Scotland’s democratic choices and preferences should be ignored.”