Humza Yousaf has today been urged to reinstate SNP whistleblowers suspended or expelled for calling out the “disgusting” mishandling of sexual harassment allegations by the party’s leadership group on North Lanarkshire Council.
Scottish Conservative deputy leader Meghan Gallacher has written to the SNP’s national leader amid claims the party’s hierarchy failed to investigate cover-up and bullying allegations relating to misconduct allegations against ex-council leader Jordan Linden.
Meghan Gallacher – herself a former North Lanarkshire councillor – said the First Minister must step in to immediately readmit the seven councillors who have spoken out against current SNP group leader Tracey Carragher and her senior colleagues.
She insisted it was time for Humza Yousaf to show some leadership and “stamp out the immoral culture that too often leads to senior SNP figures putting the party’s image ahead of doing the right thing.”
But she expressed doubts about whether this would happen, given that many of the councillors accused of cover-up over the Linden affair were party staffers employed by SNP MSPs and MPs.
Scottish Conservative Shadow deputy leader Meghan Gallacher MSP said: “The SNP leadership group on North Lanarkshire is a moral vacuum and it’s time for Humza Yousaf to intervene and stand up for those whistleblowers in his party who are inexplicably being punished.
“The First Minister has to reinstate the seven councillors who refused to tolerate attempts to cover up the Jordan Linden scandal. It’s the disgusting cabal who tried to hush this up who ought to be punished.
“Humza Yousaf needs to show some leadership and stand up for integrity. This problem extends beyond North Lanarkshire.
“We saw it when former SNP Westminster leader Ian Blackford shamefully sided with disgraced MP Patrick Grady, rather than his victim, in another sexual misconduct case.
“Humza Yousaf needs to stamp out the immoral culture that too often leads to senior SNP figures putting the party’s image ahead of doing the right thing.
“Sadly, I fear this ‘party first’ mentality is ingrained within the SNP.
“It’s telling that several of the leadership group in North Lanarkshire are party staffers employed by SNP MPs and MSPs, whose first instinct is party loyalty.
“This has to end, for the sake of future potential victims. The First Minister must act decisively and disown this shameful trait of deceit and cover-up within the SNP.”
Notes
Todays’ Times front page story on this can be found here: SNP hit by allegations of ‘sex pest cover-up’ (thetimes.co.uk)
North Lanarkshire councillors Tracey Carragher, Alan Masterton, Richard Sullivan and Margaret Hughes are all employed by SNP MSPs or MPs.