A Nationalist MP is in hot water after giving a taxpayer-funded job to her own boyfriend — with the relevant details mysteriously absent from Commons transparency registers.

Glasgow North East MP Anne McLaughlin hired consultant Graham Campbell, who advises his clients on “lobbying the authorities to get what you need”. Such nepotistic arrangements have been banned in the Scottish Parliament since 2009 but prevailed in Westminster after an outcry by MPs.

Shortly after her election McLaughlin disclosed details of her staffing in a podcast:

“I’ve got Graham Campbell working two days a week, and his role is to do funding with local community groups. I am getting a lot of groups coming to me, worried about losing their funding

This sounds eerily similar to his existing consultancy business. According to his LinkedIn, Campbell is Is the managing director of ‘Graham Campbell Fundraising & Consulting Services’.

“My objective is to help you build and sustain meaningfully and financially viable independent community organisations.

The SNP are spinning that non-cohabiting partners cannot be declared in the register of members’ interests. This didn’t seem to be a problem for Cornwall Tory Scott Mann, however, whose entry states he employs his “non-cohabiting partner … as part time Secretary.”

With limited parliamentary resources at her disposal, the niche casework priority for McLaughlin happens to be what her reported fiancé already does for a living.

Just fancy that!