MSPs investigating the Alex Salmond affair have demanded to know if the Scottish Government has been censoring its evidence to them.

They said it would “not be appropriate” if relevant material had been withheld from parliament.

The cross-party Holyrood inquiry is investigating how the Government botched a sexual misconduct probe into the former First Minister in 2018.

Government mistakes led to Mr Salmond winning a judicial review at the Court of Session the following year, leaving taxpayers to foot his £500,000 legal bill.

The probe into claims by two female civil servants was deemed unfair, unlawful and “tainted by apparent bias” because his accusers had been in prior contact with the lead investigating official. 

MSPs start public hearings on the fiasco next month, and will also consider if Nicola Sturgeon broke the ministerial code by meeting Mr Salmond while he was under investigation. 

Shortly after the Government probe fell apart in January 2019, Mr Salmond was charged with sexual assault - he was cleared of all 13 counts in March this year. 

Last month, the Scottish Government supplied hundreds of pages of documents to the committee on a newly created harassment policy it applied to Mr Salmond in early 2018.

These showed Ms Sturgeon and her office insisted the policy covered “former ministers” as well as serving ones.

Last week, the Scottish Government published much of the same material on its website in response to a freedom of information (FoI) request.

In a letter to the Government’s top official, Permanent Secretary Leslie Evans, the Holyrood inquiry said it was “deeply disappointed” at the way the FoI material had been released. 

Convener Linda Fabiani said MSPs expected it to be “treated as confidential” until the parliament published it the following week.

Complaining about the “minimal notice”, Ms Fabiani wrote: “It is extremely disappointing that the Scottish Government, in the spirit of co-operation, did not seek to manage this in a way that would have avoided putting the Committee in such an invidious position. 

“Had the Scottish Government checked when we intended to publish, it would have been possible for the Parliament and Scottish Government to co-ordinate accordingly and avoid these situations arising.”

Ms Fabiani then raised a concern about the FoI release stating that the documents - most of them heavily redacted - were “identical” to those given the month before to the committee.

She said the committee did not expect its evidence to be redacted as heavily as an FoI, as FoI rules were “wider in scope” than the basis for withholding information from parliament. 

She told Ms Evans: “We seek further clarification on the redactions”.

Ms Fabiani said the committee was particularly worried that material involving the “free and frank exchange of views for the purpose of deliberation”, which is commonly redacted before release to the public, had also been cut out of the committee’s confidential evidence.

She said: “Please confirm whether information has been redacted that would fall under this exemption before submitting the documents to the Committee. 

“We believe that it would not be appropriate to withhold information from the parliamentary inquiry on those grounds. 

“We therefore seek reassurance that the Scottish Government did not exclude any information that may be relevant to the Committee.”

Ms Fabiani also raised the Government messing up its FoI release, noting the 156 PDF files were put online then quickly removed again as some were not been properly redacted.

She said: “I find this concerning and would reiterate that the Committee will only publish the documentation you sent to us after making our own checks on the information previously supplied with reference to its agreed published statement.

“It is clearly in everyone’s interest that we have an understanding of the basis upon which you are making redactions to the documents you are sharing with the Committee and that the Committee is not put in a similar position in relation to the next tranche of documents that will be submitted to it.”

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “We have received the committee’s letter and will reply in due course.

“The names of two civil servants should have been redacted from two separate items of correspondence in line with the committee’s wishes.

“Due to an oversight this didn’t happen – and when this came to light the documents we posted were taken offline briefly to redact the two names concerned and the documents were then reinstated online.

“We remain committed to working with the committee and we welcome the opportunity the parliamentary inquiry will bring to address issues which have been raised.”