A LONG-SERVING SNP councillor has quit the party and hit out at its “McMafia” leadership after being rejected as a candidate in upcoming elections.

The party’s ruling National Executive Committee (NEC) says Renfrewshire Council’s Andy Doig is not a “fit and proper person” to stand in May.

The decision comes two years after the Johnstone North, Kilbarchan and Lochwinnoch councillor was accused of sexism and homophobia in an email about SNP colleagues sent to two party members.

Doig, whose wife Audrey is also an SNP councillor, claims the message was “a satirical spoof” and will continue as an independent.

Announcing his decision, Doig told local paper The Gazette: “I am sick of the McMafia tactics being used against me by the party I used to love.

“I have always served my constituents to the best of my ability, regardless of their own political views, and it is they I serve before any party political machine.” Doig issued a public apology for the email and the NEC initially approved his candidacy, but this has now been overturned.

Doig, who was a member of the so-called “79 Group” alongside Alex Salmond, called the email a “lapse of judgement” and has issued a public apology.

However, he implicated high-ranking members Derek MacKay, the party’s business convener, and then-national secretary Patrick Grady as part of a move to oust him.

He said: “The SNP leadership wanted to get me in a ‘night of the long sgian dubhs’.

“I very much regret leaving the post of SNP Depute Group Leader on Renfrewshire Council as my fight is not with my former colleagues but with the SNP leadership.

“It is the SNP leadership which has perpetrated this miscarriage of justice. This is not the party I joined in 1979.”

An SNP spokesperson said: “The National Executive Committee considered that Mr Doig was not a fit and proper person to represent the SNP at the coming election.”