Scottish politician and former Scottish National Party (SNP) Member of Parliament (MP) and Deputy Leader. Regarded as a left-wing fundamentalist, she left the SNP in 1982 after a disagreement on party policy. By the mid-1990s, she had returned to the SNP and in 1999 she was elected to the Scottish Parliament (MSP), representing the Lothians.
She earned a high media profile with her outspoken views on a number of issues, including sex workers’ rights and MSPs’ salaries. She quickly established herself as a rebel within the party, and was disciplined in 2000 for missing a parliamentary vote without permission and briefing a Sunday newspaper against party policy.
She was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 1996, but this was not disclosed publicly until Margo decided to stand as an independent. For this, she was officially expelled from the SNP on 28 January 2003: she said that her health diagnosis had been leaked to the press by “forces of darkness”, but a spokesperson for the SNP insisted that the leak did not come from within the party.
She later became an Independent Member of the Scottish Parliament for the Lothian region. She established herself as a forceful and respected presenter of various radio and television programmes, and later contributed regularly to Scottish newspapers.
She became an activist for the Right to Die Campaign (assisted suicide), using her own health circumstances in her advocacy.
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