Angus MacNeil expelled from SNP after row with party’s chief whip
The MP Angus MacNeil has announced he has been expelled from the Scottish Nationalist party (SNP).
He was suspended from the party’s Westminster group last month after reportedly clashing with its chief whip, Brendan O’Hara.
The party’s conduct committee met on Thursday to discuss his case after he refused to immediately rejoin the group at the end of his suspension.
MacNeil, 53, has represented the Na h-Eileanan an Iar , or Western Isles constituency since 2005.
He tweeted about his expulsion, using a kangaroo emoji to refer to the member conduct committee.
He said: “The Summer of Member Expulsion, has indeed come to pass. As I have been expelled as a rank & file SNP member by a ‘member conduct committee’.
“I didn’t leave the SNP - the SNP have left me. I wish they were as bothered about independence as they are about me!”
He was suspended from the Westminster group for a week in early July following reports of a row with Mr O’Hara in the House of Commons.
Later that month his membership of the party was suspended later the same month because he refused to immediately rejoin the SNP group.
He released a statement attacking the SNP leadership’s approach to independence, accusing it of a lack of urgency.
“I will only seek the SNP whip again if it is clear that the SNP are pursuing independence,” he wrote.
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Thursday’s decision by the conduct committee means he is no longer able to sit as an SNP MP and appears to rule out any reconciliation with the party.
On Wednesday, SNP The party’s Westminster leader, Stephen Flynn, was asked about MacNeil on Wednesday when he spoke to journalists on the byelection campaign trail in Rutherglen and Hamilton West.
He said the party’s MPs should not pick and choose when they hold the party whip, but that would not give a “running commentary” on the conduct process and he “gets on well with Angus”.
Flynn said he and his colleagues wanted a positive outcome”, but added that this was not always possible in politics.