In February this year, Guido shone a light on the Scottish book publishers Sandstone Press, who announced they were to release of book of Nicola Sturgeon’s greatest speeches just days after the Scottish Parliament Elections. Guido pointed out not only is their managing director Robert Davidson a big SNP supporter, his company had been given tonnes of National Lottery money via Creative Scotland. Their rivals accused them of becoming a “nationalised publisher”. Sandstone is now under investigation by Scotland’s financial crimes unit.

Sandstone faces fraud accusations over the receipt of loans and grants worth £295,000 at the taxpayers’ expense. Officers from the unit will specifically probe whether rules were broken when Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) awarded grants and loans to Sandstone.

Keith Charters, managing director of one of Sandstone’s rivals even wrote to Sturgeon warning of concerns and now says it is “deeply concerning that, when we blew the whistle on how HIE had provided Sandstone with that £120,000 – when we provided the First Minister with detailed evidence of suspected wrongdoing – the response of her officials was to vilify us for daring to challenge on the basis of the evidence.” Oh Hubris…