KEZIA Dugdale has shaken-up her all-male top team with the appointment of a female policy director for Scottish Labour.
The award-winning journalist Gina Davidson will take up the key position later this month.
Ms Davidson, who was named Journalist of the Year at the 2013 Scottish Press Awards for exposing the Mortonhall baby ashes scandal, succeeds acting policy director David Ross.
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She was associate editor of the Edinburgh Evening News for seven years until 2015, and is currently a freelance writer, copywriter and media trainer.
Ms Dugdale was criticised for contributing to the Holyrood “boys’ club” last month after appointing Scottish Daily Mail political editor Alan Roden as her communications director, and Martin McCluskey as her political director, alongside Mr Ross.
The Scottish Labour leader helped launched the Women 50:50 campaign two years ago calling for equal gender representation in parliament, councils and public boards.
Although three of the five parties are Holyrood are lead by women, men dominate the backroom operations in every one, and all five party presses bosses are men.
It was reported last week that Ms Dugdale had failed to secure the policy director’s job for her political ally Mandy Telford, a member of the Blairite pressure group Progress.
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Ms Telford, a former president of the National Union of Students and campaigner for Liz Kendall in the 2015 labour leadership contest, was rejected by a panel of MSPs.
Ms Davidson, 44, a Labour branch secretary in the 1980s, said: “I’m delighted to be joining Scottish Labour to work for Kezia and the other MSPs and help them get their key messages across to the electorate. It’s very exciting time as the new team is being put together.”
Ms Dugdale said: “Gina joins us with years of experience in investigatory journalism, a track record in management, and a long-standing campaigning record with the Labour Party.
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“She is a significant addition to our team as we prepare for the local government elections in 2017 and our ongoing work of holding the SNP Government to account.”
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