Stewart Malcolm McDonald

Stewart McDonald is the MP for Glasgow South. He was elected to parliament in 2015, winning the largest majority in the city. McDonald is the SNP’s Defence Spokesperson and was appointed to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee after the 2019 General Election. He lists his other interests as fair work, human rights, combating disinformation (McDonald participated “defeating disinformation” training with the Woodrow Wilson International Centre in February 2020), and LGBTI equality. McDonald’s “proudest political achievement” was attached to his passion for fair work – he bought forward a Private Members Bill to ban unpaid trial shifts. McDonald explained that unpaid trial shifts hit “the lowest paid and the lowest skilled in our economy” thus his bill was “to protect the lowest paid and the lowest skilled.” The bill was talked out of the Commons so did not become law. Despite this defeat, McDonald has continued his campaign for more regulation and a page of updates can be found on his website under the heading #WorkTrialsOnTrial. In 2015, McDonald gathered together a group of LGBT SNP MPs to campaign for a “Yes” vote in the Irish Same-Sex Marriage Referendum. McDonald has been open about the prejudice he has endured as a gay man. In 2016, he tweeted his disappointment after he and his partner were questioned by a receptionist when checking in to their double room at a hotel in New York – “Same-sex couples just shouldn’t have to go through this kind of stuff in 2016”, McDonald told Pink News. When asked if there were any books or poems that had influenced his choice of career, McDonald answered ‘Open The Doors’ by Edwin Morgan, the poem that was written for the opening of Scottish Parliament in 2004. The poem concludes with the line, “So now begin. Open the doors and begin.”