ANGUS MacNeil gave SNP high command no choice but to expel him from the party, MPs have said.
The long-serving Western Isles MP had his roughly 30-year membership of the SNP ended on Thursday night, announcing the news on Twitter and accusing the party of running a kangaroo court.
But his Westminster colleagues have said his actions – including a ferocious row with chief whip Brendan O’Hara and subsequently refusing an invitation back into the fold – made the decision of party mandarins for them.
One MP told The National he felt MacNeil was “bloody stupid” in refusing to take back the party whip after he had been suspended.
MacNeil said he had been targeted because of his focus on independence, accusing the party of not being "bothered" about the constitutional question.
Last month, he had been suspended from the parliamentary group following a heated argument with O’Hara because he had missed votes. It has been reported MacNeil threatened the chief whip, though the MP denies this.
He was offered to have the whip restored, which he turned down, leading to his expulsion from the party by the SNP’s membership conduct committee.
It means he is no longer a rank-and-file, card-carrying member of the SNP for the first time in around 30 years.
One MP told The National: “I think things could have been handled better on all sides but at the end of the day, the fundamental issue is you don’t get to pick and choose when you take up the whip.
“That was Angus’s death knell as far as I could see.”
In his tweet announcing he had quit the party, MacNeil, now an independent MP, claimed: “I didn't leave the SNP – the SNP have left me.”
Despite being well-liked by his colleagues, the MP found himself increasingly at odds with the leadership in Edinburgh – especially over its coalition deal with the Greens in Holyrood and what he viewed as a lack of focus on securing Scottish independence.
He has spoken out against the Bute House Agreement, which gave the Scottish Greens government roles, and was also fiercely critical of the Government’s now-shelved plans for widespread fishing bans in a tenth of Scotland’s waters.
But one MP said he had strayed so far from the party line in recent months, it was only a matter of time before he faced the consequences of his outspokenness, telling The National: “He was SNP in name only for a long time.”
Another said: “Given that he effectively removed himself from party membership, with that stance he took, that’s probably the only logical position that can be taken.
“His stance was bloody stupid. Angus is a lovely guy, he’s a loose cannon and he can think for himself.
“You need a few folk that can think for themselves but he’s wired to the moon on this. His stance makes no logical sense.”
SNP leader Humza Yousaf said he felt MacNeil’s expulsion from the party was right.
Speaking at Iain Dale’s All Talk show at the Edinburgh Fringe, the First Minister said: “I don’t understand this point about ‘the SNP left me’. He literally left the SNP.
“He literally wrote a public statement that said, ‘I’m not going to take the whip, I am not going to rejoin the SNP group’.”
