Defector MSP could be banished to ‘cupboard’ style office by petty SNP chiefs

PETTY SNP chiefs want to “banish” defector MSP Ash Regan to a “cupboard” style office at Holyrood, it is claimed.

Several Green staffers are said to have objected to a plan by parly bosses to shift Ms Regan to an office beside them due to discomfort over her opposition to gender self-ID.

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And a Holyrood source last night told how the SNP offered up an alternative plan to put her in a room — smaller than a usual MSP’s office — used for storage and hot-desking for Nats staffers.

Former SNP minister Ms Regan jumped ship to Alex Salmond’s Alba Party last month, prompting the question of whether she should be shifted from her current room among her old colleagues.

Our photos today show storage boxes piled up in the modest new proposed office — a standard MSP room split in two.

It would see the SNP retain the room next door.

The insider said: “It’s a stalemate.

“There was a solution proposed where Ash would go at the end of a corridor where the Greens and Lib Dems are.

“This would mean the Greens moving up one, but they are refusing.

An SNP idea was to put Ash in an MSP office that’s been split in two.

There’s not even room for a staffer at the front, which is standard for others. It would effectively mean she is banished to a glorified cupboard.”

We told last month how former SNP leadership contender Ms Regan — the ex Community Safety Minister — switched to Alba and accused the Nats of failing to pursue independence properly.

Ms Regan’s office situation is being thrashed out behind the scenes by party whips in the parly’s business bureau, chaired by Presiding Officer Alison Johnstone.

An original suggestion had been to shift Ms Regan to the Green MSP Ross Greer’s office at the far end of a ground floor corridor.

Another to move her to a shared SNP-Tory corridor would have meant several Tory MSPs had to shift offices — a plan that bombed with the Conservatives.

Separately, an Alba Party insider told how some Nats politicians were acting in a “petty” manner and had been giving Ms Regan “the cold shoulder” in parliament.

A source in another party said: “This could be sorted if the Greens stopped acting like children.”

An SNP source confirmed the plan for Ms Regan to use their hot-desking area, and stressed it would mean the SNP giving up space.

Alba said it hoped a solution would be found soon.

Parliament was asked for comment.

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