JOANNA Cherry has said that plans for the SNP annual conference are “well advanced” after some members expressed doubts over whether the online event would take place as expected next month.
The party’s justice and home affairs spokeswoman at Westminster last week called for delegates attending the conference to vote off members “with vendettas” from the SNP’s ruling national executive committee.
Her intervention followed a controversial decision by the body to change the rules requiring MPs to stand down before standing for election to Holyrood. As a result of the revised process Cherry, MP for Edinburgh South West, withdrew her bid to stand for selection to be the SNP candidate for Edinburgh Central at next year’s Scottish Parliament election.
Some insiders told The National yesterday that they were concerned the conference may not take place this month as they do not yet have the notifications they would have otherwise received if the conference is to take place over the next four weeks. Others said they had heard the online event may take place in November.
Writing on Twitter, Cherry said: “I’m sure there will be an SNP conference and NEC elections because they are required by our party constitution.
“I’ve been assured that plans facilitating it online are well advanced. Re the NEC election delegates already vote online.”
There is suspicion among some members that the party’s ruling body is not pushing for a conference imminently amid the possibility a new NEC with more Alex Salmond supporters could move to suspend Peter Murrell as the party’s chief executive and investigate WhatsApp messages he allegedly sent about the former First Minister. Murrell is married to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
Last week MP Kenny MacAskill, justice secretary under Salmond, called for Murrell to be suspended from his post and for the SNP to investigate the messages.
Separately, a Police Scotland inquiry has been launched into the leak of the texts which appear to show Murrell calling for pressure to be put on the police t investigate the former First Minister.
“We are in September now, so it’s going to be very difficult to have the conference in October,”a source said. “There is resistance to hold a conference as a new NEC would be more likely to suspend Peter Murrell and have an investigation into the Whatsapp messages.”
The source added: “If it was going to be happening in October there would need to be notifications going out as branches have a set amount of days to submit and amend motions. Given the timetable, there is now not enough time for that to happen if the conference is to take place in October.”
The SNP were approached on Tuesday for comment and did not respond.
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