NICOLA Sturgeon must live up to the high ethical standards she set herself and others and resign if she is found to have breached the Scottish Ministerial Code over the Alex Salmond affair, Sir Keir Starmer has said.

The UK Labour leader said the First Minister should follow her own words in the introduction to the code or risk undermining the integrity of the Scottish Parliament.

On the second day of a 48-hour visit to Scotland, Sir Keir said that if he was in government, he would expect any of his ministers who broke the code to resign.

He said: “If you’re going to have integrity in the Westminster parliament or the Scottish Parliament, then a breach of the ministerial code… ought to lead to a resignation.

“If you don’t have resignations following a breach of the ministerial code, you undermine the integrity of parliament, whether it’s the Scottish Parliament or the UK Parliament.” 

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar also said it would wrong for the First Minister to “hide” behind an argument over whether any breach was knowing or inadvertent.

He said: “Misleading is misleading. A breach is a breach, and I think we would expect our ministers, regardless of party or personality, to be held to the highest standards.”

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Ms Sturgeon is under growing pressure to stand down after the Holyrood inquiry into the Salmond affair found she had misled it, and therefore misled parliament.

Misleading parliament and failing to correct it is a breach of the code, and ministers who knowingly mislead parliament are expected to resign.

In her introduction to the current edition of the code, published in February 2018, Ms Sturgeon wrote: “I will lead by example in following the letter and spirit of this Code, and I expect that Ministers and civil servants will do likewise.” 

A narrow majority of MSPs on the inquiry concluded Ms Sturgeon gave “an inaccurate account” of her actions when she denied offering to intervene in a Government sexual misconduct probe into her predecessor in 2018.

The First Minister maintains she told the truth in her eight-hour evidence session earlier this month, and has attacked a “partisan” leak of the finding ahead of the report being published in full on Tuesday.

A separate report by an independent advisor, James Hamilton QC, is due to give a definitive ruling on whether Ms Sturgeon misled parliament next week.

Speaking to the media online this morning , Sir Keir said it was important not to prejudge either report, but the principle involved was clear.

He said: "Obviously the focus is very much on the individual, Nicola Sturgeon, but it’s bigger than that.

“It’s about the integrity of the Scottish Parliament, it’s about the integrity of the office of the First Minister, and standards in public life.

“The foreword to the latest edition of the ministerial code was written by Nicola Sturgeon as first minister and she said in that foreword, I quote: ‘I will lead by example in following the letter and the spirit of this code’.

“So she set high standards and now she needs to live up to those high standards. But we’ll have to wait and see what the report actually says next week.”

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Mr Sarwar added: "I think it’s important in these issues to remove party and remove personality, and look at the principles about protecting the office of the First Minister, and protecting the integrity of the Scottish Parliament.

“I have been very clear, of course the First Minister is entitled to due process. She has the right to wait till the publication of those reports.

“But I am in no doubt that if a minister, regardless of party or personality, is found to have misled parliament, and is found to have breached the ministerial code, then the code is very clear - that minister is expected to resign.”

Asked about the ministerial code specifying “knowingly” misleading parliament as a trigger for resignation, rather than inadvertently misleading it, Mr Sarwar said: “A breach is a breach and a misleading of the parliament is a misleading of the parliament.

“Only the first Minister herself can say or judge whether she knowingly did it or unknowingly did it.

"But there is the principle of corroboration, and what we’ve seen from reports is that there are three individuals who say a situation happened and the First Minister refutes that claim.

“I don’t think we should hide behind ‘inadvertent’ or ‘knowingly’ kind of claim. Misleading is misleading.

"A breach is a breach, and I think we would expect our ministers, regardless of party or personality, to be held to the highest standards.”

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Asked if they or their own ministers would resign for breaching the code if they were in Government, Mr Sarwar and Sir Keir both said they would.

Mr Sarwar, a former MP and now a Glasgow list MSP said: “If this was the other way around, what would Nicola Sturgeon be saying right now if she was in opposition and Labour was in government, or the Conservatives or Liberal Democrats were in government in Scotland?

“She’d be saying, on the point of principal, if a minister has breached the ministerial code, they should resign. So I’m going to hold her to the same standards she would expect me to be held to if it was the other way around.

“Taking out party and talking out personality, if there’s been a breach, I would expect that minister to resign.”

Sir Ker added: “I agree, and I don’t think this is about individuals. It’s about the principle of the thing.

"If you’re going to have integrity in the Westminster parliament or the Scottish Parliament, then a breach of the ministerial code, as set out in the ministerial code, in either parliament, ought to lead to a resignation.

“If you don’t have resignations following a breach of the ministerial code, you undermine the integrity of parliament, whether it’s the Scottish Parliament or the UK Parlliament.” 

The inquiry is looking at how the Scottish Government bungled its probe into sexual misconduct allegations levelled against Mr Salmond in 2018.

The former FM had the exercise set aside in a judicial review by showing it was "tainted by apparent bias", a flaw that left taxpayers with a £512,000 bill for his costs.

After the Government's defence collapsed, Ms Sturgeon told MSPs she had three meetings with Mr Salmond while he was under investigation by her officials.

It is understood the inquiry concluded Ms Sturgeon misled parliament over a meeting she had with Mr Salmond at her Glasgow home on April 2, 2018.

The First Minister initially insisted she did not know what Mr Salmond wanted to discuss with her, then changed her story in light of other people's evidence.

She has consistently said she did not offer to intervene in the misconduct probe, despite him asking her to help resolve the matter quietly by mediation. 

In her written evidence, she said: “I made clear to him that I had no role in the process and would not seek to intervene in it.”

In her oral evidence, she added: "As First Minister, I refused to follow the age-old pattern of allowing a powerful man to use his  status and connections to get what he wants.

"I feel very strongly that it would not have been right for me to intervene, however much I might, in my heart, have wanted to help a friend, although the nature of the situation was more complex than that.

"It would not have been right for me to do it, and that is why I did not do it."

However other witnesses said Ms Sturgeon did offer to intervene in the probe.

In particular, the former SNP MSP Duncan Hamilton QC, who was at the April 2 meeting as Mr Salmond's legal adviser, said in written evidence: “My clear recollection is that her words were ‘If it comes to it, I will intervene.’ 

“From a legal perspective, that was the most important aspect of the meeting. I therefore remember it clearly.”

In her oral evidece, Ms Sturgeon then tried to backtrack on her earlier emphatic claim that she was clear with Mr Salmond above stay out of the process.

She said Mr Salmond and others might have taken away the wrong impression because she had been trying to "let a long-standing friend and colleague down gently".

She said: "Perhaps I did that too gently and he left with an impression that I did not intend to give him. I think that I was clear, and I certainly intended to be clear."