TOMMY Sheppard and Ian Blackford have confirmed they will put themselves forward in the contest to become the new SNP group leader at Westminster.

Nominations for the post open this morning and the winner will be unveiled tomorrow night after a vote by the party’s 35 MPs.

Ian Blackford, the MP for Ross, Skye and Lochaber, announced at around 5pm yesterday that he would be putting himself forward.

“I can confirm that I will be a candidate for SNP group leader at Westminster. As it is an internal election I will make no further comment,” he tweeted.

Edinburgh East MP Sheppard later tweeted that he would be putting himself forward.

“Pleased to say I have decided to seek nomination for @theSNP Westminster group leader,” he said in a post.

Pete Wishart, Joanna Cherry, Drew Hendry and Stephen Gethins are also believed to be considering whether they will stand.

A statement by the SNP last night said: “The SNP will select a new Westminster Group Leader this week.

“Nominations will open to MPs tomorrow morning, with the election of the new Group Leader to be announced on Wednesday evening.”

Sheppard is standing on a platform of radical change in a bid to persuade Yes supporters who switched to Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour in the General Election last Thursday to move back to the SNP.

He has told friends he sees this phenomenon as the most pressing and immediate challenge for the party, and a bigger one than the drift to the Tories in the north-east. “Tommy believes there is a real sense that even though we won the election last Thursday we lost a lot of seats, some of which we shouldn’t have done,” a SNP insider told The National.

“There were a lot of factors at play but the one Tommy is most worried about is the swing from people who voted Yes in 2014, who voted for the SNP in 2015 and 2016 and who moved to Corbyn last week.

“Tommy wants them back and believes to get them back the SNP needs to rediscover its radical edge and tell them it is the SNP that is the voice of radical Scotland.

“And as long as Scotland is in the UK we will strive to change things for the better in the UK.”

The source added: “Tommy thinks we are at peak Tory and is worried there are dozens of seats that are under threat from Labour. Given there might be a General Election before the end of the year he believes this is an issue which needs to be addressed promptly.”

The contest for a new Westminster leader is taking place after Robertson lost his Moray seat to Tory MSP Douglas Ross.

Robertson, who remains as depute SNP leader, regularly won praise across the political spectrum for his weekly performances holding the Conservative government to account at Prime Minster’s Questions, and is a major loss to the Westminster group.

Former First Minister Alex Salmond lost his Gordon seat in what was the biggest shock of the night for the SNP as the Tories took six seats in the north-east and Labour picked up seats in the Central Belt.