SNP leader urges MP to give up her seat after defecting to Tories

Humza Yousaf has urged Lisa Cameron, the Scottish National party politician who has defected to the Conservatives, to do the "honourable thing" and resign as an MP.

- Severin Carrell, Libby Brooks

Scotland's first minister told the Guardian that Cameron's decision to cross the floor, after accusing the SNP of "toxic and bullying" behaviour, was a betrayal of her constituents and of the party activists who had campaigned to get her elected.

Yousaf said: "She was elected on an SNP ticket, not a Conservative ticket. The people of her constituency elected and wanted an SNP MP, and she's decided to defect to the Tories.

"It's a betrayal of her constituents. It's a big betrayal of her activists who really would have worked hard, pounding the pavements delivering the leaflets, doing the canvassing, day in and day out to get her elected because she was an SNP MP-so it's a real kick in the gut for them."

Cameron had been signalling for weeks that she could quit as an MP and force a byelection after accusing the SNP's Westminster group of bullying and ostracising her after she spoke up for a party worker who was sexually harassed by the then chief whip, Patrick Grady.

Instead she announced yesterday that she had joined the Tories, claiming that Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, had been far more supportive of her and had shown "positive, inclusive leadership".