Lotto winners donate another £1m to SNP

EuroMillions Lottery winners Colin and Chris Weir donated £1m to the SNP in the run-up to the general election.

New figures from the Electoral Commission for the first three months of this year show that they gifted £500,000 each to the party.

In total, the couple, from Largs, Ayrshire, have given the SNP £3m since they won £161m on the Lottery in 2011.

The SNP received a total of £1,055,250 in donations between January and March 2015.

In addition, the party also received public funding of £48,659 from the House of Commons' "short money" fund, which is given to opposition parties to help with their costs.

Elsewhere, political parties across the UK received a total of just over £30m in donations in the first three months of 2015. Of that, more than half was gifted to the Conservative Party, with more than £9m being donated to Labour.

An SNP spokeswoman said: "We thank all of our donors - big and small - for contributing to the success of the party, including the historic events at the general election and consistently being ahead in the polls after eight years in government, which is a remarkable achievement."

Mr and Mrs Weir, who have described themselves as being "lifelong supporters of independence", gifted the SNP £1m in September 2011 following their lottery win and a further £1m in February last year. They also provided £3.5m in funding for the "Yes" campaign, prior to the Scottish independence referendum.

In addition to their support for the SNP, the Weirs have used their fortune to fund a number of good causes, including buying a 13-year-old boy a prosthetic leg, and they have established a charitable trust to help fund health, sport, cultural, recreational and animal welfare projects.