Never seeing my son and sickening trolls are forcing me out of job I love
MSP blames Holyrood’s refusal to introduce family-friendly reforms and online abuse for her decision to leave politics
A leading MSP has opened her heart over the separation from her young son, online abuse and police panic alarm that convinced her to quit.
Gail Ross announced last month that she will stand down from the Scottish Parliament at the next election, blaming Holyrood’s refusal to introduce family-friendly reforms for her decision to leave the job she loves.
And, in an exclusive interview with the Sunday Mail, the married mum of one has now revealed the highs and “dark” lows she has experienced representing Caithness, Sutherland and Ross for the SNP.
While the pressure of spending at least three days a week hundreds of miles away from her nine-year- old son Max is the primary reason for her quitting, the popular MSP has insisted it is time to “call out” shocking personal attacks female politicians endure.
She said: “I have two personal alarms now that I need to carry about with me. One is hooked up to the local police station and the other is a regular alarm.
“I was given them after a thread of online posts were reported to parliament security and they contacted the police, who came to see me. I was also advised not to hold surgeries on my own any more.
“This stuff was coming from my local area, which was really difficult because I was born there, my family all live there and I was brought up there.
“I have tried my best to do this job and do it on behalf of people I represent. So to have feedback that nothing I do is good enough and to know that parliament security think it’s not safe for me was really hard.”
Gail, 42, who lives in Wick, Caithness, with high school teacher husband Stewart and Max, added: “I absolutely don’t want my story to put anyone off coming into politics. But I do think most of the female MSPs get abuse online.
“Women are treated differently to men and made the targets of more personal attacks. The feedback I have had from other female politicians is that I am not
alone. Certainly, the First Minister has had it a lot more than I have.
“So that sort of stuff is terrifying. It is obviously going to put people off if nothing is done about it.
“The job has been great but there have been aspects of it that have been quite dark.
“Would things have been different if the abuse hadn’t happened? Probably not – it was about family in the end, even though those other issues were in the background.”
When she was elected in 2016, Ross was widely regarded as a breath of fresh air in Holyrood and tipped for a high-flying ministerial career.
Unlike many other parliamentarians, she had experience in a number of jobs, having worked for her dad’s bakery and in newspaper advertising sales rather than solely in politics.
But she announced she was standing down next year after pleas for reforms that would allow MSPs in rural constituencies to vote remotely and use video conferencing were ignored. She added: “If you are a parent and you have a child at any age, it is difficult to be away from home for long periods of time.
“I got elected a few days before my son turned six and I was due down in Parliament the day of his birthday.
“I remember a very senior Holyrood manager told me to take an extra day because I wasn’t going to get to spend a lot of birthdays with him in the future.
“So that was a sign of what was to come and that’s been difficult. I have missed birthdays, sports days, parents’ nights – it’s just part of the job.
“I put forward some proposals to the standards committee about video conferencing and remote voting.
“They said there was an issue with security with remote voting and it was an untested technology but I really don’t see the issue with exploring it a bit further. They said there is no other country in the world that votes remotely but we are supposed to be leading the world like we have done on so many other things.”
Ross has previously spoken out about her own mental health battles and admitted that the pressure of 12-hour days, extensive travel and days on end away from home have all taken their toll.
She added: “We do very long days. It can start at 8am and then there are events at night. It is just solid all the way through and then constituency work at home. There is little time for your family.
“You do need to be a certain type of person to be a politician – you need to have quite a thick skin. I have made no secret of my problems with mental health in the past and this job is very challenging on your mental health.
“There are times where I just have to be a different person when I am down here and disassociate myself from the person I am when I am at home.
“Down here, I need to be Gail Ross the politician, when I go home I can be Gail Ross the mother and wife and friend and daughter – that can be a strain being two different people.”
While admitting that leaving Parliament will be an emotional upheaval, Ross is looking forward to taking on new challenges.
She has ruled out returning to Highland Council, where she sat before being elected to Holyrood.
But she added: “I have had career changes before so I’m not fazed. As long as I have more time to spend with my family and my cats and in my garden, I’ll be OK.
“When I discussed leaving with Max, his first question was, ‘Will you get to see your friends if you don’t stand?’ His first thought was for me.
“I have no doubt that the lead-up to March next year will be very emotional but I have still got a year to achieve things and get on with representing my constituents.
“I got into politics to try to make life better for people and the best thing about this job is doing that, even if it’s in small ways.
“I don’t think it is a huge deal that I have decided to leave now. It is my life and I am quite comfortable with the decision I have made.
“If it opens up a discussion about the way Parliament works and about the way we attract people with families, young people, people with disabilities, then that is a positive because we need to have these discussions.”
Women are made the targets of more personal attacks. It can be terrifying