YOU DO THE MATHS

Swinney and SNP under fire after abstaining from vote | Sarwar accuses Nats of using the Tory playbook

- PAUL HUTCHEON

FIRST Minister John Swinney has been slammed for failing to back a parliament ban on Michael Matheson over the iPad scandal.

FIRST Minister John Swinney has been slammed for failing to back a parliament ban on Michael Matheson over the iPad scandal. Shamed MSP Matheson was banned from Holyrood for 27 days yesterday and had £11,000 of his wages docked after trying to get the taxpayer to foot the bill for massive data roaming charges on his parliament devices.

He initially claimed the charges were for legitimate parliamentary business but it later emerged it was a result of streaming football matches on a family holiday in Morocco.

MSPs voted yesterday to impose a heavy punishment on Matheson - but Swinney and his SNP colleagues were heavily criticised after they abstained on the sanction vote on the disgraced former Health Secretary.

Swinney was likened to Boris Johnson and Donald Trump after criticising the Holyrood Standards committee which proposed the ban.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said: "John Swinney has tried to play the Boris Johnson and Conservative Party playbook.