Nicola Sturgeon's former chief of staff lands director role at book festival where star speaker is...Nicola Sturgeon!
Liz Lloyd has been taken on by the Edinburgh International Book Festival because of her 'valuable experience in communications, leadership and public affairs'.
It comes as Ms Sturgeon prepares to appear at the event in August to promote her memoir, entitled Frankly – and amid a row over the lack of gender-critical writers on the programme.
Ms Sturgeon tried to drive through abortive transgender reforms while in office - while Ms Lloyd recently said she did not 'think either side of this [transgender] debate could really walk around with a halo over their head saying, you know, we got this absolutely right'.
Ms Lloyd, 47, who now works for political risk consulting firm Flint Global, described herself as a 'thought partner' for the former First Minister.
In a message in November 2020, during the Covif epidemic, Ms Lloyd said: 'I just want a good old-fashioned rammy so can think [sic] about something other than sick people.'
Last night a Scottish Tory source said: 'Any hopes that Nicola Sturgeon might be subject to frank scrutiny when she plugs her self-serving book appear to have been dashed by this appointment.
'What next - Val McDermid [a crime writer and friend of Ms Sturgeon] 'grilling' her on her record?'
A spokesman for the Edinburgh International Book Festival said: 'We are pleased to welcome Liz Lloyd to the board of the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
'Her appointment follows a fully advertised recruitment process, and she will bring valuable experience in communications, leadership and public affairs.
'Recent and upcoming board appointments reflect a broad range of expertise to support the Festival's strategic direction.
'Programming decisions remain solely with our executive and programming teams.'
The Festival did not disclose Ms Lloyd's remuneration, and the latest accounts for the event, up to the end of 2023, pre-date Ms Lloyd's tenure.
They show one unnamed director received payments for 'consultancy fees' of £18,557.
Ms Lloyd was contacted for comment.
Edinburgh International Book Festival, which is partially funded by the Scottish Government, has been criticised for giving a platform to Ms Sturgeon but not including gender-critical authors.
The annual event has the theme of 'repair' - but is not hosting those on the opposite side of the gender debate to the SNP.
It was plunged into financial woes last year after complaints from Left-wing activists, and the Scottish Greens, forced Baillie Gifford to withdraw its sponsorship.
The multinational company was criticised for its investments in fossil fuels, with climate change activists threatening to disrupt some of the events.
New funding was supplied by Edinburgh-based crime author Ian Rankin as well as additional cash coming from the Scottish Government and the People's Postcode Lottery.
But the line-up infuriated some writers who claimed no feminists are scheduled to speak.
Jenny Lindsay, who has written about being 'hounded' out of Scotland's literary scene due to speaking up for women's rights, was one of the most vocal critics.
She wrote on social media platform X: 'I can't believe I missed that the theme is 'repair', and they've booked hounders over those hounded, are continuing to ostracise successful feminist writers trying to 'repair' after houndings, AND they're featuring many activist writers who had their funding destroyed last year and called them all sorts of names.'
Two Scottish Tory MSPs also condemned the Edinburgh line-up.
Tess White said it was 'very disappointing that Edinburgh International Book Festival has given a platform to people like Nicola Sturgeon, but not to authors like Jenny Lindsay who have suffered such significant personal and professional cost from speaking out against self-ID'.
Fellow Tory MSP Pam Gosal added Edinburgh International Book festival's theme this year is 'repair' - yet 'they refuse to invite Jenny Lindsay and other feminist writers opposed to [gender] self-ID'.
She said that instead they have 'given a platform to Nicola Sturgeon who threw women and girls under the bus'.
There was also no invite for the authors behind the Sunday Times bestseller The Women Who Wouldn't Wheest - a series of essays about the battle for women's rights in Scotland.
One of those behind it, Susan Dalgety, said that she 'never really expected' to be invited.
She wrote on X that it included essays about how 'the book festival industry, like Nicola Sturgeon, had dismissed us as bigots and our book, and those by Jenny Lindsay, were simply 'not valid''.
Ms Dalgety added: 'One of the biggest challenges facing Scotland [and the rest of the UK] in recent years is the social and cultural divide that has arisen, not between the wealthy and working people, but between the 'lanyard' class and the rest of us.
'The Edinburgh Book Festival (and others) largely pander to this small clique of middle-class folk whose luxury beliefs reinforce the power structures that celebrated the mutilation of children and put the demands of men first before the rights of even the most vulnerable women.
'But it's their loss, because some of the best thinking and creativity around is being done by women who have (re)discovered the power of their individual and collective voices.'
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