More ex-government ministers claim Humza Yousaf deliberately skipped gay marriage vote
Two former government ministers have claimed SNP leadership candidate Humza Yousaf deliberately avoided a Scottish Parliament vote on gay marriage.The Sunday Mail has spoken to the senior politicians who last night piled more pressure on the health minister to explain if he was excused due to pressure from religious leaders.Yousaf is the favourite to replace Nicola Sturgeon as party leader and first minister, followed closely by finance minister Kate Forbes.She provoked a storm of controversy last week by saying she wouldn’t have voted in support of equal marriage had she been an MSP in February 2014 when the bill was passed.That turned the focus on Yousaf’s record who – despite saying he supports it – wasn’t at the key vote because of an apparently unavoidable meeting to help a Scot imprisoned in Pakistan.Former SNP health secretary Alex Neil has already accused the leadership candidate of lying and yesterday the Sunday Mail spoke to two other Scottish Government cabinet members from the time who have questioned Yousaf’s version of events.One said: “There is absolutely no doubt that Alex Neil’s version of events is correct and that Humza skipped the vote because he was under pressure from religious leaders.“A message was communicated to then-First Minister Alex Salmond through Joe Fitzpatrick, who dealt with parliamentary business at that time.“The request to miss the vote was granted, nobody had a particular problem with it at the time.Get all the top Scottish politics news sent straight to your Inbox by signing up to our Politics newsletter.We cover Holyrood, Westminster and local councils, with a current focus on how our governments are handling the coronavirus pandemic.To sign up, simply enter your email address
