Humza Yousaf has been urged to adopt a radical plan which would see the SNP withdraw its MPs from Westminster if the British Government refuses to allow another vote on Scottish independence.
Dunfermline MP Douglas Chapman, who is stepping down at the next General Election, proposed the move at the party’s conference.
Under the plan, the SNP’s leader in the House of Commons, Stephen Flynn MP, would lead the withdrawal in a move that echoes that of Sinn Féin.
The Irish republican party’s MPs refuse to take their seats in Westminster in protest over a British institution ruling over people on the island of Ireland.
Mr Chapman wants the SNP to take a similar stand if the next UK Government refuses to negotiate with the Scottish Nationalists if they win their “mandate”.
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He said such an exit would be followed by a national assembly to discuss how to break up the United Kingdom.
Writing in pro-independence newspaper The National, he said: “My argument is that the status quo is broken, and if anyone thinks having Labour in the hot seat at Westminster will change this stalemate, then they’ve got their head in the clouds.
“And given we’ve had mandate after mandate without any material change, we need to ask ourselves, how much longer can we remain voiceless?
“Withdrawal from Westminster isn’t just about forming an eye-catching conga, marching out of the House of Commons and hitting some headlines that day.
“It has a strong, clear, and far wider purpose and would need to be followed up by a national assembly or similar convention in our capital city as we proposed in our original motion.
“This assembly would comprise MSPs, Scottish MPs, and representatives from Scottish civic society.”
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The idea has already been dismissed as a “juvenile stunt” by rivals, with Scottish Conservative shadow constitution secretary Donald Cameron saying: “Voters have repeatedly made it clear they won’t treat General Elections as a de facto referendum.
“Yet senior SNP MPs are now taking Nicola Sturgeon’s unpopular plan and proposing an even more extreme plan.”
“On top of that, they are also talking up the prospect of another juvenile stunt in the House of Commons if they don’t get their way.
“Voters are sick and tired of the SNP pushing their independence obsession at every turn.”
In a further sign of the growing divide between the SNP’s MPs in Westminster and MSPs at Holyrood, Mr Chapman criticised some of the “unpopular” policies currently being looked at by the Nats in power, according to the Scottish Daily Express.
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He added: “There’s been quite the stooshie recently about independence. And not from the usual Unionist quarters I may add.
“Incredibly, these heated discussions have been taking place in the SNP, the very party of independence, the very vehicle for Scottish sovereignty. I find that quite astonishing.
“To argue, from the loss of a by-election and some poor polling results, that the SNP should de-centre independence from its raison d’etre seems to me to be a rather foolhardy and short-term response, especially when the party is pushing policies that are far less popular with the public than independence, and have had to do an about-turn on a whole host of these policies already, with a number of U-turns still waiting (expensively) in the wings.”
The SNP were trounced in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election last week. Labour took the constituency after securing more than twice the votes of the nationalist party.
Mr Yousaf will address SNP members in Aberdeen on Tuesday (October 17) as he brings his party’s conference, which is due to start on Sunday, to a close.
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