McConnell: under fire

The battle for the Holyrood elections has turned prematurely bitter, with Labour attacking its coalition Liberal Democrat partners as the SNP mounted an attack on Jack McConnell's constituency finances.

The spats came as all parties north of the border gear up for the May 1 poll for the Scottish parliament.

The SNP revealed on Monday that the Electoral Commission has found Jack McConnell's constituency party guilty of breaking the law after failing to register almost £10,000 pounds in donations.

In a letter to SNP leader John Swinney, Electoral Commission chairman Sam Younger said McConnell's party had breached the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 by not registering nearly £10,000 in donations.

The SNP's election co-ordinator, Nicola Sturgeon, said the party had exposed "the sleaze at the heart of Jack McConnell's Labour Party".

"It is confirmation that far from being a muddle, Jack McConnell's constituency party broke the law by hiding almost £10,000 of donations," she said.

"The Electoral Commission's findings also reveal that far from being cleared up, as Jack McConnell would have us believe, this affair still leaves any number of questions unanswered.

"With a police investigation still ongoing, the bad smell that lingers around Jack McConnell and his constituency party is not likely to go away any time soon."

In a separate move Labour was accused of negative campaigning after a leaked document alleged the Lib Dems, who share Scottish government with McConnell's party, were "soft on crime".

Jim Wallace, the Scottish Lib Dem leader and deputy first minister, attacked Labour's tactics.

"The fact that I've presided over the biggest number ever of police officers in Scotland and the highest detection rates since the Second World War, I think gives lie to that kind of allegation," he told BBC Scotland.

"I'm disappointed that so far ahead of the election that they've resorted to negative campaigning."

"If you look at our record you can see why Labour might be nervous, because when people say 'what are the things that have made a difference in this parliament', plus, for example the abolition of tuition fees or the introduction of free personal care, these wouldn't have happened without Liberal Democrats in government."

In its leaked memo, Labour dismissed the Lib Dems as "opportunistic".

"They cannot be trusted to make the hard choices that are needed in government," it read. "They are soft on drugs and soft on crime."