She stated "We may lose the battle, but we will win the war.”, in relation to the case against Salmond, which he argued did not "seem the words of an impartial public servant", and he suggested it was evidence she had been responsible for the unlawful and biased complaints process.

Noel Dolan, who was Nicola Sturgeon's senior special adviser when she was deputy first minister under Salmond, said Evans had to go for the "good" of the Scottish civil service, adding: "The original inquiry was a mess.

This reported in March 2021, recommending that investigation of complaints against former ministers should be fully independent as the current procedure was "self-evidently problematic", saying "the risks of perception of bias, either in favour of or against the person complained about, are obvious".

[11][12] An inquiry by the Committee on the Scottish Government Handling of Harassment Complaints concluded that an "individual failing" by Evans was instrumental in the collapse of the defence to the judicial review action by Salmond.

It stated that the major errors were a failure to identify crucial documents early and choosing an investigator who had previous contact with the women complainants.

It must be questioned why the Permanent Secretary in her role and with her knowledge did not ensure that the relevant information was extracted and processed at a much earlier stage.

[15]Evans is married to Derek McVay, a former member of 1970s Edinburgh punk group The Visitors who became a production manager for the jazz-funk band Jamiroquai.