SNP election candidate slammed after suggesting Royal Family should be executed

Carol Beattie, a former chief executive at Stirling Council, is standing in a by-election for John Swinney's party next month.

An SNP election candidate has been forced to apologise after sharing a social media post which suggested the Royal Family should be executed.

Carol Beattie, a former local authority chief executive, is standing to become a councillor for the Falkirk South ward at a by-election on October 17.

She was hailed just days ago by the local SNP group as a "fantastic" candidate who offered voters a high "calibre and skillset".

It then emerged that Beattie had previously shared a June 16 post criticising an article for saying that 'lesser mortals would have stayed at home' but Catherine going out in public showed 'the show goes on'.

The post said: "F*** all the way off with your gold plated serfdom! Time for the French solution to monarchy and sycophantic 'journalists'".

Beattie was until May the chief executive of Stirling Council on a six-figure salary.

In another post written herself, she said "intelligent people don't support the monarchy" and those who did "use them as symbols of their bigotry or xenophobic values".

In a statement to the Daily Mail last night, she said: "I apologise for any offence caused by the language I used and have removed the tweets."

Beattie had previously talked up her suitability for elected office.

"As a local resident I am excited to see the progress being made in regenerating Falkirk town centre and encouraged by the investment our SNP administration is making on local housing across the Falkirk South ward," she said this week.

"But I also know just how challenging things are for our people. After years of Tory austerity hitting the pockets and opportunities of everyone in our communities, this new Labour government is already showing us the type of government they are going to be.

"People may have voted for change at the recent general election, on the understanding that things will get better, but they didn’t vote to make our pensioners colder or poorer."

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Scottish Conservative MSP Stephen Kerr said he was "genuinely surprised" to see Beattie as an SNP candidate. He added: "I was Stirling’s MP and had many occasions to meet with Ms Beattie.

"How does someone go from being an impartial high ranking public servant to a highly partisan political candidate in under six months?"

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