Na h-Eileanan an Iar MP Angus MacNeil takes part in less than half of votes in Parliament.
A meeting between Mr MacNeil and SNP chief whip Brendan O’Hara led to an argument on July 3.
He confirmed this week that he had declined to fully rejoin the party following the end of a week-long suspension after the incident.
He says he will not retake the whip “until it is clear that the SNP are pursuing independence”.
Since 2019, Mr MacNeil has attended 45% of votes, the lowest percentage of any SNP MP.
According to data from The Public Whip, the average vote attendance for a Scottish MP is 63.6%.
So why is Mr MacNeil taking part in almost 20% fewer votes than average?
Does vote attendance matter?
Vote attendance isn’t necessarily indicative of how actively engaged an MP is. They may simply be selective about which motions they vote for, for example.
Mr MacNeil says an MP might not attend votes “because they are attending to other issues or have travel problems”.
He also alludes to a lack of impact behind an individual MP’s vote on a motion.
“In this parliament there are no tight votes given the Tory majority, as a result they win each and every vote,” he says.
In the past, Mr MacNeil has spoken out in favour of introducing remote voting for MPs.
He noted that travel difficulties makes in-person voting much harder for MPs based a long distance from London.
However, compared other MPs in the Highlands and Islands, Mr MacNeil’s voting attendance is still unusually low.
Orkney MP Alistair Carmichael, for instance, has a recent voting attendance of 76.2% – over 30% higher than Mr MacNeil, and 10% higher than average.
Despite this, taxpayers have paid slightly more in travel and accommodation expenses for Mr MacNeil than Mr Carmichael in the last year.
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