Former Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale admits to voting SNP

Kezia Dugdale voted for the SNP while she was still a sitting Labour MSP.

The former Scottish Labour leader backed her rival party at the European Parliament election in 2019 owing to dissatisfaction with Labour’s stance on Brexit.

She told a BBC documentary: “I voted SNP once in my life and that was in the European Union elections immediately after Brexit, where I was so mad about Brexit.”

She added that she felt safe voting for the pro-independence party at that election “because that in no way could be construed as a vote for independence”.

Dugdale stepped down as an MSP and left the Labour Party in 2019, two months after that year’s European election.

She added: “I voted Labour in every election since then.”

She was leader of the Scottish Labour party from 2015 to 2017, saying at the time she wanted to “pass the baton” onto the person who would lead the party into the 2021 Scottish Parliament election.

The move was widely seen as a response to Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. The MSP was a vocal critic of the then Labour leader and called for him to resign in June 2016.

Dugdale, who is married to the SNP education secretary Jenny Gilruth, went on to take up the role of director at Glasgow University’s John Smith Centre.

It was announced on Monday that she has now left that role but will stay on as a Professor of Practice, “with expanded responsibilities” at the university.

It was previously known that Dugdale had not backed Labour at the European elections but not which party she had voted for instead.