A friend of the disgraced Scottish MP Margaret Ferrier and senior figure in the Scottish National party claimed on Monday that she had put her party first by travelling to Westminster while suffering from Covid. The former SNP MP George Kerevan said her decision to travel back to Glasgow after testing positive was an obvious “lapse of judgment” that put others in danger. But in a reflection of divisions within the party over her treatment he claimed she was a victim of a trial by media fuelled by “virtue signallers” in his own party. He came to her defence shortly after the leader of the party in Westminster, Ian Blackford, piled pressure on the MP to resign her Rutherglen and Hamilton West seat by saying she should do “the honourable thing” before being forced out. Blackford told the Daily Telegraph Ferrier should resign to save her “self-respect and dignity”. She has already lost the party whip and is subject to a police and a House of Commons investigation, but has ignored calls for her resignation from Blackford, the party leader, Nicola Sturgeon, and others.
One fellow SNP politician said they were “astonished” that she was trying to tough it out when voters were facing self-isolation, economic hardship and the loss of loved ones through Covid. But others within the party said they could not believe how the leadership was “feeding the media”. Ferrier was entitled to due process and knew that she would inevitably “have to face her constituents”, a source said. The MP has referred herself to the Commons standards commissioner but it is not expected to conclude its investigation for some time. The shortest investigation it has ever undertaken took two weeks. It can trigger a process involving suspension from the house for 10 days to allow constituents to decide whether they want a byelection, in what is known as a recall vote. Kerevan and other supporters in the SNP say Ferrier is being “hounded” for something she has already admitted is indefensible, but that she deserves the due process of the police investigation if she has broken the law. One pointed out that an MP accused of rape during the summer has been allowed due process and not suspended from the house while police investigations continue. In what is believed to have been an oblique reference to Ferrier, Lindsay Hoyle, the speaker of the House of Commons warned MPs not to raise the incident casually in a covid debate on Monday telling them “that the conduct of another member should not be criticised on the floor of the house other than by a substantive motion”. Writing in the National newspaper in Scotland, Keravan said “the feeding frenzy against Margaret has pained me”.
He added: “I feel deeply for Margaret and find much of the virtue signalling and rush to consign her to political outer darkness both hypocritical and blatantly self-serving. Margaret Ferrier, in my experience, always put the job before her personal convenience.” Another SNP source pointed out that she was ill and had the right to recover before deciding her course of action. “Have you ever known an MP to resign who has been accused of breaking the law? I cannot think of any sitting MP who has not been afforded due process. If this were a Tory I would say exactly the same.” Others in the SNP say they are “astonished” she has not resigned.