Scottish Labour was in turmoil again last night after Paul McKinney, the party's new spin doctor, resigned after a series of rows with the leadership.
Mr McKinney, the 32-year-old Scottish Television producer who joined Labour only seven weeks ago, said he was leaving ''for personal reasons'' and was not contactable last night. His absence from Keir Hardie House in Glasgow over the past few days had caused speculation about his future.
After repeated inquiries last night by The Herald, an embarrassed Labour Party announced his resignation and issued a formal statement in the name of the new general secretary, Alex Rowley, who praised Mr McKinney's ''significant contribution to the party in Scotland.''
As Opposition parties queued to ridicule Labour's latest crisis, the job of dealing with the Scottish media on behalf of Labour was returned to Angus MacLeod, whom Mr McKinney supplanted as official voice of the party in Scotland less than two months ago. Mr MacLeod had earlier dismissed any talk of a problem with his new boss.
No-one in the party would go on the record to confirm the nature of Mr McKinney's difficulties, but the growing speculation in recent days was that he was deeply disturbed about the role of David Whitton, another former STV journalist, who was appointed three weeks ago as spin doctor to Donald Dewar.
One Labour onlooker said last night: ''There was no personal problem between Paul and David, but there was a real difficulty with the job David was doing after he came on the scene. Paul's difficulty was with the party, not with David.''
Mr McKinney privately expressed gloom at the difficulties he saw in his new role when he celebrated his birthday last week.
Friends later talked of his concern that his expectations were not being realised - and pointed to the arrival of Mr Whitton in Mr Dewar's private office on a higher salary that that of Mr McKinney and with a wide-ranging role as the Secretary of State's personal spin doctor.
Although the two men were hired to explain different aspects of policy - Mr McKinney in a purely political role and Mr Whitton to interpret Government policy - the two jobs overlapped, a fact which is believed to have upset Mr McKinney, whose departure after so short a time is a major embarrassment to Labour in Scotland.
The party, accustomed to accusations of being media-obsessed, was believed to have hired Mr McKinney after pressure from London, a fact which was seized on by the SNP, whose chief executive Michael Russell last night claimed this vindicated his party's criticisms.
He said: ''The wheels are coming off New Labour in Scotland. The new raft of spin doctors to be run by Paul McKinney was imposed on Labour by London and financed with London money. But it has clearly run into insurmountable problems in Scotland.''
Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Jim Wallace said: ''Oh dear! It seems Labour's much-vaunted spin doctors are spinning out of control. This really does give the appearance of being a shambles. But basically those who live by spin will die by spin. The Labour Party must be hoping that they don't lose any more spin doctors, because without their spin there won't be very much left.''
The Scottish Tories were also scornful. Party chairman Raymond Robertson said: ''The record quick departure of Paul McKinney perhaps bears testimony to just how nerve-racking it must be trying to sell Labour's let-downs to the people of Scotland.''
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